Morgan has released two sets of federal poll results: a mid-week phone poll of 765 respondents, and a face-to-face poll of 897 respondents conducted last weekened. Morgan has gone against normal practice by using “preferences distributed by how electors say they will vote” for the headline two-party measure for the phone poll, which puts Labor’s lead at 64-36. The more reliable “preferences distributed by how electors voted at the 2007 election” has it at 62.5-37.5, down from 63.5-36.5 last week. The face-to-face poll has it at 62-38, the same as the previous such poll conducted a fortnight ago.
Other news:
• The main starters are in place for the Gippsland by-election. The Nationals have nominated Darren Chester, staffer to state party leader Peter Ryan; Labor has nominated Wellington Shire mayor Darren McCubbin; and the Liberal candidate is Central Gippsland Health Service bureaucrat Rohan Fitzgerald. Gerard McManus of the Herald Sun reports Labor internal polling has them on 36 per cent to the Nationals’ 32 per cent and the Liberals’ 19 per cent, which after preferences would mean a comfortable win for the Nationals.
• On Monday, The West Australian published a Westpoll survey of 406 voters concerning federal voting intention in Western Australia, which had Labor leading 62-38 – a 16 per cent turn-around from the federal election. A question on preferred Liberal leader had Peter Costello on 19 per cent, Malcolm Turnbull on 18 per cent, local hero Julie Bishop on 17 per cent, Brendan Nelson on 12 per cent and Joe Hockey on 11 per cent. The survey also gauged support on a republic, finding 51 per cent support against 33 per cent outright opposition, with 70 per cent supporting a referendum on the matter to coincide with the next election (leaving aside the small matter of the model being proposed).
• Norm Kelly, member of the Australian National University’s Democratic Audit and former Western Australian Democrats state MP, peruses the government’s recently announced package of electoral reforms and finds fault with the move to tie public campaign funding to verified expenditure (clearly introduced to prevent a repeat of Pauline Hanson’s $200,000-plus windfalls from her recent Senate campaigns), which he says will disadvantage minor parties in its proposed form.
• Radio National’s The National Interest program had an interesting item recently on campaign funding laws in New York City and Canada. The practice of the former makes it very hard to understand why donations for last year’s federal election won’t be disclosed until February next year (to the extent that they still need to be disclosed at all, following the Howard government’s disgraceful 2006 “reforms”).
• The Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters is inviting submissions for its inquiry into the 2007 federal election, which will be received until Friday, May 16.
• I have just had to cough up $400 for annual site hosting, so now would be a good time for those who like to make the occasional donation.
UPDATE: Victorian Greens upper house MP Greg Barber drops by in comments to plug a parliamentary inquiry into the state’s donation disclosure laws. Reader ShowsOn tells us he has been Newspoll-ed, and that we can expect Tuesday’s poll to feature responses on who would make the best Liberal leader out of Brendan Nelson, Julie Bishop, Peter Costello and Malcolm Turnbull; who would make the best leadership team out of Nelson/Bishop, Costello/Turnbull and Turnbull/Andrew Robb; and who out of Turnbull and Wayne Swan would be best at handling the economy.
381 Comments
Its great to see another magnificent set of numbers, well done Labor. Not impressed with Peter Garrett and the lack of ticker regarding plastic bags tho.
Inflation is expected to reach a 17 year high and the Libs of course will blame the 6 month old Labor government and take no responsibility at all.
This goes to show the Listening Tour of Dr Nelson is working. Numbers dont lie.
Causation, causation, causation!!!!
1 sinowestie
Agreed with the lack of ticker at first glance, but I believe for all the talk that this government will tread carefully on the hip pocket issues as it’s clearly the only area the coalition can make any gains.
Another way of looking at it is that there’s just not enough public support for the idea all over Australia. Note how Garrett made the states go out and explain their actions? SA will take the lead, prove there is no negative consequences, and it will spread Australia wide within 18 months.
on the polls – listening isn’t doing the job Brendan.
“On 4 December 2006 Mr Rudd was elected as the 19th leader of the Australian Labor Party”
F&(k me if that isn’t the longest honeymoon in history.
watch the torie gippsland by-election spinning start in earnest. they’ll paint it as a possible Labor win and then cheer a Nationals win as a rejection of Rudd and the end of the honeymoon. dont say I didnt warn you…
and i must add my disappointment at the plastic bag thing
Shanahan was in today’s Oz suggesting that Nelson would be gone by July. Let’s see if he even makes it that long.
#8 – That’s what the opening p’graph of the column says; but the rest of the column suggests that Shanahan is playing devil’s advocate. He argues that Nelson might be in for the long haul (or at least, beyond July), and the reasons he gives are actually plausible.
Or in other words, Shanahan’s articles are now carry about the same insight and weight as something posted on pollbludger.
Or in other words, Shanahan’s articles are now carry about the same insight and weight as something posted on pollbludger.
Hey! The posters on Pollbludger are never that petulant.
Fortunately the Opposition and media attempts to assassinate any trivial thing the Rudd government hasn’t help the Opposition improve its standing.
The press will now hopefully deal with the government in an even handed way and instead of glossing over begin focussing on the difficulties within the Opposition, their cause and how they might be solved. Turning the heat up on the Opposition might force them to deal with their problems.
“Rudd has become more than a leader, he’s become a phenomenon. He’s been able to turn every potential setback or embarrassment into gold.” – Shanahan’s Opinion piece.
Is Shanahan admitting defeat here? Every effort by S. and his fellow reporters to smear Rudd has actually finished up working for him, not against him .
Or in other words, Shanahan’s articles are now carry about the same insight… …as something posted on pollbludger.
As a group we called the election pretty accurately, several weeks in advance. Some even got the actual number of seats right.
Compare and contrast to the MSM, in particular the senior opinionistas in the Murdoch franchise.
Doug @ #13
We are, I fear witness to the born again true believers, hallelujah brothers & sisters praise be to Rudd!
I’m sure that this is the OO way of telling the Libs “Listen guys, we can’t continue to support a loser like Nelson without seriously damaging our brand name and credibility. Unless you can come up with a new leader we have no option but to support Rudd.”
Either way you’ll be crowing about the Liberals not winning the Seat of Gippsland and calling for Nelson’s head. That Labor is on 36% primary should be viewed as a win even though they’ll probably lose out to the Nationals considering the preference flows of the Liberals.
Still considering the retirement of a popular local MP and Rudd’s large lead in all opinion polls would indicate that Labor should be red hot favourites to win the seat given the small 5.5% margin. But its nice to know that solid Tory seats aren’t turning Red anytime soon by the looks of things.
Would a Gippsland win make Warren Truss safe as the Nats leader lol?
I am not happy that because of the ALP i’d have to pay 25c per plastic bag for the shopping, this is environmentalism gone mad! Why should Victorians suffer this stupid tax while other States don’t!
Also why is Rudd bringing out pie in the sky ideas with no idea how to implement them or how much they’ll cost, is this really how our Government should work??? He’s doing it for media attention that’s it.
I also am not happy Nelson is going to this bogus 20/20 Summit, especially since he has trashed it and is still going i mean it’s not like he’d lose any more points on PPM by not going and it would make a statement that the whole process is basically there to support Labor’s policy platforms for the future, Republic, Bill of Rights ect.
Glen ,
So what would you do regarding plastic bags? Don’t you think it’s a waste of resources to get one every time you pop into Safeway on Bay St?
17 That Labor is on 36% primary should be viewed as a win
Glen, that might be a win in Toryland but Labor only counts a win as over 50% of the vote.
No i just don’t think people should be charged for plastic bags, grocery prices are already higher than ever and that should be Rudd’s main problem to fix after all his campaign promises Chris IMHO.
Steve i was merely positing that for the left to get 36% primary vote in a solid Tory seat was a good effort for them. Pigs will fly if the ALP gets 50% of the primary vote in Gippsland.
Glen, you didn’t answer the question – what do you think should be done to reduce the number (6 BILLION) of palstice bags used (most one only) in Australia?
Glen, not good enough though! Labor still need to improve 15% after all so as not to reward a party who sat back and did nothing while horseflu took off. Let alone the slap in the face delivered by the Nationals in wasting the Gippsland electorate’s time for almost half a year when the current member could have just stepped down before the last election.
They’d be far better off with a Government member who could deliver some real benefits to Gippsland than an opposition that has nothing to offer except division and turmoil. The Opposition could not even muster a quorum for shadow Cabinet this week, so out of touch have they become.
I did hear that the shadow Cabinet decisions were written on the back of a postage stamp this week and there was more than enough room left for next week’s minutes as well.
Does a Nat win in Gippsland save Nelson’s bacon because it is a coalition hold? Or does it accelerate his demise because of the Liberal’s woeful primary vote?
Fascinating.
It would certainly be a huge reversal of Australian political history so far sceptic, people usually swim away from a sinking ship not towards it.
Re: my post at 6. And right on cue, Glen starts the tory false expectation of an ALP gippsland victory. you guys are nothing if not predictable
Andrew, according to the latest polling he may well be right. Labor certainly has a lot of work to do if they are to win.
GE last Nov gave Nats 5.9% margin in Gippsland.
Labor polling now has it now at 6%! What a sneaky lot they are!
What a wally Gerard McManus of the Herald Sun is for swallowing this crap served up by Labor. Anything for a story I guess, but really, he does look a fool.
Labor has improved its stocks in EVERY electorate since the election and even though Gippsland is unlikely to fall to Labor, they will (sitting member spits dummy, Rudd on high etc) cut the margin to less than 2% at the by-election.
Current poll with 6% 2PP margin to the Nats is just so much fantasy.
Glen @#17 wrote:
He did?
http://www.theage.com.au/news/opinion/liberals-in-purgatory-and-far-from-heaven/2008/02/28/1203788534735.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1
Michelle Grattan, The Age, 29 February 2008
Sounds like as glowing a spiel of praise as one could expect from an Opposition Leader for a government initiative.
It was his colleagues, eg Joe Hockey, who insubordinated him by “trashing” the summit.
Any regular PBers going to 2020?
Why would internal Labor party “polling” supposely be leaked right now? What are they after by leaking?
Simple, you leak polling suggesting that the ALP won’t win, which means that after a by-election win the leader will not under as much pressure as he is currently. So anti-Nelson forces have to weigh up whether to risk waiting for after the byelection or not, as a byelection win is going to weaken the urge to dump Nelson. So there might be a an urge to get rid of him before hand, in case, there is a by-election win.
Whoever leaked this “polling” is very smart as they know it does more damage to the other side then their own (they might even be reading from the book of Fairman with this cleaver move). It might even help get the TBs out on the Labor side of things.
Gippsland is a seat with a somewhat parochial flavour. McGauran was seen as a local member who was in tune with local concerns. The nature of the candidates will be important here. That means it’s not just an issue of political party preference. If the Labor candidate is perceived as a genuine local person he’s in with a chance.
22
steve – that is the comment we used when we were in Government in 2004 why have an opposition MP when you could have a Government MP. In actual fact it is a stupid proposition, for by your logic because Labor is in power people shouldn’t vote Liberal as they wont get anything from the Government if they do.
OH MY DOG!
The Howard government didn’t budget a single dollar for the N.T. intervention from July 1st of this year!
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23558210-5013871,00.html
What a pack of economic dunces! Thank dog they are no longer in control of the treasury.
Hey does anyone know when the new Queensland state electorate boundaries draft will be released? Thought that it would be this month.
The NT Intervention was an election stunt that the got themselves trapped into saying they were making it an important long term goal.
Howard’s statements at the time were that the intervention would take tens of millions of dollars and about 6 months…..he quickly added to that when Labor didn’t bite and focus fell back on him. It was intended as a wedge and also an opportunity to find some victims and suspects to parade before the electorate….however human rights stepped in and Howard couldn’t forceable inspect children to find victims in a hurry. The Howard govt’s intentions were not much better than Tampa and SIEVEX.
If anyone cares, I’ve added a bit on Monday’s Westpoll to this post, which slipped my mind earlier.
Glen you only get charged for the plastic bag if your too stupid to work out an alternative, and having people work out an alternative is the aim of the exercise.
34
ShowsOn
Costello didn’t budget for extra childcare places etc for all the extra babies born because of the baby bonus. Crap Treasurer!
William re donations I sent you a cheque for $40 last Jan that I don’t think you ever cashed??
the victorian parliament will conduct an inquiry into the adequacy of donation disclosure under victorian law, after a motion i moved was supported unanimously. debate was last wednesday 16th in the legislative council.
http://www.parliament.vic.gov.au/downloadhansard/council.htm
here’s the TOR:
That this House requires the Electoral Matters Committee to inquire, consider and report no later than 30 April 2009 on —
(1) whether the Electoral Act 2002 should be amended to create a system of political donations disclosure and/or restrictions on political donations; and
(2) the outcome resulting from similar legislative reforms introduced in Canada, the United Kingdom and other relevant jurisdictions.
I just got Newspolled for the first time ever!
They asked extended questions on the Liberal leadership.
They asked who do you think would make the best leader, out of:
Nelson, Bishop, Costello, Turnbull
They also asked who would make the best leadership “team” out of:
Nelson / Bishop, Costello / Turnbull, Turnbull / Robb
They also asked who would be “Best at handling the Australian economy”
Turnbull or Swan
I didn’t bother to explain to them that the treasurer doesn’t actually handle the economy, our economy works by markets.
Apart from that it seems they were doing market research for BHP-Billiton, the private health insurance industry, and internet job search services.
It’s hard to say which is the more unreliable source for accurate polling for Gippsland, the Herals-Sun or the ALP. When I lived there briefly in the 70s, 25% was a good result for Labor.
2020 Summit.
Tim Fischer.
Why, did the Coalition let him and Kennett slip?
I’ve added an update to note the contributions of Greg Barber (who to those not familiar with him is a Victorian Greens state MP) and ShowsOn’s intelligence on the next Newspoll.
35 John, last I saw the QEC had decided that due to the council elections taking more time than planned, the Queensland redistribution is now due in mid May.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/04/19/2221698.htm?section=justin
“Mr Truss says he does not expect much to come out of the summit for regional Australia.
“It’s all very well to assemble a thousand people with great ideas; what’s most important is to determine what are the good ideas and which ones won’t work, and that’s a political process and I don’t think the Rudd Government’s up to it,” he said.”
Something is seriously wrong at coalition HQ. They have, and continue to, brand themselves as negative to the entire process and any possible outcomes of the 2020 summit. I just cannot imagine the low intelligence idiot who thinks that’s a good strategy. They have made themselves totally reliant on the event being a complete failure for there to be any political gain for them whatsoever.
They may be right, but nailing yourself to one side of the fence was/is never going to be good political strategy.
I’ve said it before; there’s certainly no chess players amongst them. They need to go and buy a copy of ‘politics for dummies’ from their local book store.
what the hell is wrong with the tried and true “we’ll be watching closely and reserve our judgement…”?
Regarding Gippsland, I know Maffra played a large part in Kennett’s downfall. They had a 16% swing to the independent. Craig Ingram. This was caused by the selling off of the Water Commission. Maffra is only ten minutes from Sale and Nambrok, which is the McGauren’s home town. A lot of locals are still angry about this.
Onimod,
If i were from the country, I would be insulted by Truss’s comments. Sure you are supposed to oppose the government, but remember the rural part of 2020 is being chaired by one of your own. These people only want what is best for Rural Australia. Us in the city don’t want to hate them, but with Truss and co. the example for Rural Australia, if they don’t want any help. Fine. Let you communitees die. Just don’t cry poor because you didn’t help your communitees prosper
Correction. Let them help your communnites prosper.
I have sent this message off to Warren Truss.
You wonder if country people are happy being led by the National Party’s chronic negativity. No wonder so many young people leave the bush. Can’t blame them.
We haven’t heard from Gippslander for a while, I wonder if he can give us some feedback.
HooHoo
The demographics do suggest that the bush population is getting older comparatively, but I can’t believe they’re all so happy with the status quo as to be happy for nothing to change. I’m also not so sure that as the older generation isn’t starting to adopt their children and grandchildren’s ideals – they can’t be happy about their families deserting them out there in the bush.
As I’ve said before, chronic negativity really only has positive effect late in an election campaign. It certainly felt like the coalition was constantly campaigning in the last decade and I just reckon the general population has become conditioned, and therefore unresponsive to it all.
Omimod,
I am only making the chronic negativity comment because as a 24 year old who battled alienation as a child and has worked hard to get into the workforce and into University, I cannot understand why Australians are so negative. It is so sad for a country with great potential.
Thank you for reminding me Thomarse, it had been gathering dust in my wallet for the past six months. I have finally cashed it now, so I hope you’re still solvent.
Just imagine if the Newspolls start showing around 57/43. What will they do then? Will they be frozen for another 18 months until too late to change and the polls still exceed 55/45? Anything above 53/47 pushes the ALP further ahead.
You can just imagine the Nelson supporters believing he can make a further come back and the others becoming more vexed.
Inevitably around election time we will get in the region of 55/45 which will feel like an improvement, but still a disaster. Do they go for another leader hoping to close the gap or do they worry a new leader might widen the gap. All the more reason for the Turnbull faction to have a timetable coming up to the election year that ignores whatever the polls are showing.
I refer to our local Nationals member as ‘the man who stops things from happening’ because that’s become his role – he simply opposes projects the governments are proposing.
To me, that would be too soul destroying to contemplate but I suppose he feels he’s voicing the concerns of his electorate.
Whether he’s meeting their needs is a different issue.
55 – Kina: It is almost in the ALP’s interest that Nelson polling improves a little soon. Also keep in mind that we might be back to the polls sooner rather than later if something major is opposed in the Senate. For example, if some Carbon trading legalisation is meet with opposition, both from the right (for going too far) and the Greens (for not going far enough), we could be back at the booths in March. So it is critical the deed is done fast or not at all.
I standby my guess that there is a minor chance next weekend of a shoulder tap coming Nelson’s way. And a bad newspoll on Tuesday might be some more straw for the camel’s back.
I want the Liberals to switch to Turnbull ASAP, because that means Rudd will bring on the Republic as a wedge issue.
58 After his performance on the Listening tour. I think the sittings the fortnight after the budget will finish Nelson. He is just not up to the required standard.
steve,
I think you’re right – Nelson will go in the aftermath of the budget. Turnbull will get the job, by default as much as anything.
Why not pre-budget? The budget will give the new guy fresh attack material. If Nelson is still in the job at budget time, then any attack on the budget is basically wasted.
There was division in the Labor Party regarding their choice of candidate for Gippsland. The Liberals have chosen someone with very little profile.
The Nats normally don’t perform well in polling, so I don’t trust those figures. If they are true, Chester will romp home.
ShowsOn
have a read of this:
“As expected, the republic featured prominently in the governance stream, with most delegates favouring constitutional change in the next two years.
The group showed their support for a rapid removal of the monarchy from the Australian system, voting for a deadline of 2010 after a 12-year timeline received lukewarm support. Labor MP Maxine McKew, in charge of that stream, urged delegates to show more passion for the subject after their initial recommendations failed to draw even a single “whoop” from the group.”
2 years means they pretty much have to get things rolling asap after the budget.
Is that representative of the electorate’s views? I hope so.
Then we have this from Nelson:
“I have quite a few ideas but I’m hardly going to come here and tell Mr Rudd what my ideas are for Australia’s future.”
…’cause it’s all about you mate…
what a f*(king stupid selfish pri<k
Why is Nelson there then? He should have stayed away. This bloke has lost it.
Apologies for the language, but that statement from Nelson really makes my blood boil.
It really should ensure he loses pre selection in his own electorate or the seat itself if his local party doesn’t have the guts.
That sort of thing shows outright disrespect of your constituents, and as the opposition leader, the Australian people as a whole. When the hell does he think we DO deserve to hear what his ideas might be? It’s not as though he’s riding so high in the polls that he can afford to meter the treats out as required.
It’s just so 5th grade primary school I can’t believe it.
No wonder people are becoming disillusioned with government in this country. That sort of statement is going to end up giving the ALP cart blanche to rearrange the system, because evidently the LP haven’t bothered to get engaged.
What sort of opposition or alternative is that?
stupid stupid stupid
61 Don’t think the Liberal Party would be capable of organising anything in that timeframe at present BSF. If they could he’d be gone already.
Secondly, the only remnant of Liberal grassroots organisation has snookered itself into believing that the Liberal Party resurrection arrives on budget night 2008. Like a doomsday cult locked in their cave they busily write the modern day version of ‘Letters to the Editor’ on Newspaper blog sites.
Of course when Swan delivers the budget and newspoll doesn’t reflect their doomsday scenarios. Nelson will pay for this heightened expectation that is out there which will turn on the Liberals when the well organised blog commenters realise they have been duped.
The Poisoned Dwarf is in fine form this morning. Not factually correct of course and lacking quotes and sources to back up his claims but true to form.
onimod Says:
The trouble is Rudd is changing the game and poor Nelson isn’t keeping up with the rule changes.
Bolter – you wern’t invited. Deal with it.
It doesn’t matter if the ideas arn’t new. The 2020 summit at least gives people an opportunity to discuss them. Anyone working in government would know how long it takes to get an idea to be heard at the top levels or at least put on the list of considerations.
I just hope a few worthy ideas are put forward, publicly debated and have the opportunity to get legs before 2020 rather than continuing to float around in discussions but going nowhere.
Quick question – does anyone know what happened to Jim Middleton? Chris Uhlmann is so negative.
70 Sarah
Chris certainly struggles with the concept of an outright compliment doesn’t he? Me thinks he should stop sucking on lemons as a start, talk straight like a man, and give the subtext (or at least the impression of it) a break. Say it like you mean it Chris, and if you can’t put in plain english, then it probably means you, as a chief political correspondent, shouldn’t be saying it.
Jim Middleton’s current baby is on right now:
http://www.abc.net.au/corp/pubs/media/s2048572.htm
2020 is a toss festival. I don’t normally agree with Bolt but I agree with him on this. You can’t claim to be the elites and claim to represent the masses at the same time. And is there actual debate or just a lot of head nodding going on? The meeting sizes (100 people) are far too large to be seriously productive and the time period is too short for serious policy development.
But in terms of PR, it is not a bad idea but it could fall flat if nothing comes from it. Not that it will any harm to the Government as it is that far ahead of Nelson’s mob.
BS Fairman. If Andrew Bolt got an invite He’d be there with bells on. Notice how he took free kicks at Nelson – Right wing columnist telling the Liberal party that his time is up!
72 Blair S. Fairman are you making your Bolt like comments from a position of observation ie following the summit on sky or from an impression. I really get annoyed how some in the media wrote it off before it even began. For heaven sake at least see the results of it before righting it off as a waste of time. It may be but that is yet to be determined surely.
Make that “writing”
72 Blair
I though it was an ‘ideas’ summit?
The policy is the government’s job in the future.
No one intends that the world is solved before Sunday night, just have some idea on what that world we need to save might be.
Are you against things changing or getting better outright?
Are you happy with the status quo?
What is your idea, and please, to be true to your inference, please communicate this without talking.
Bolt lost me completely when he labelled the participants as a bunch of leftists and other choice labels. This is clearly wrong. This man is obsessed which for me casts a great shadow over the rest of his opinions. I take what he says with a big grain of salt.
I don’t have Sky (that might make me an elite if I did) but I have been watching ABC 2 coverage (which reminds me of primary school concert videos in terms of production values).
I am sure it will deliver some very nice motherhood statements, which are useful in their own way, but the fine details are not going to be given the time to be developed. And a lot of the motherhood statements will be rehashed ideas (like reduce childhood obesity, improve life expectancy for indigenous people, etc) that nobody is going to argue against.
And there is no way Bolt would have gone if invited. He is an obstructionist, so it is not his style to take part. Plus it would be like hell for him, being in a room with so many lefties (might have been funny to watch however).
76 – I am not opposed to change, I just prefer action to talk. We already know the goals, it is the tactics that are really needed.
78 – They were Bolt “lefties” (ie any to the left of him). I don’t think they are all lefties myself.
Blair
We’ve come to a point in our political process where all action is met with resistance and we seem obsessed with that resistance, no matter what the cost on the possible positive outcomes might be.
I don’t think we really do know what the goals are. I feel sure that if we did that we wouldn’t be in some of the predicaments we do find ourselves in.
I think it’s desperately important that we start prioritising the goals so that resistance can be given the proportional response it deserves.
I’ve use this one here before: “there’s nothing so unwelcome as the right idea from the wrong person”
Every politician is that ‘wrong person’ on our society at present, and it’s no wonder that progress is stifled. There’s no mortgage on a good idea, but if it has to come from our community leaders rather than out politicians to gain traction, surely that’s a process worth attempting?
Also, action without thought or discussion is surely best exhibited in the actions of Barry Hall last weekend? How do you think that action you speak of really happens?
It sounds to me like you’d be happy for some results, but that’ you like to be blissfully ignorant of how those results might be procured to me. Action is a process, not an outcome.
71 onimod, thanks for the tip where Jim Middleton has gone. Good for him but a loss for insiders and ABC news though. Also agree with your view on Chris – he does tend to have a one sided view.
79 – I agree tactics are needed but one step at a time. Onto the public agenda, big buy in, corporate and celeb support. Sure we know the goals but the rest of consumeristic Auzzie land doesn’t. Once everyone knows what is going on and there is an alternative to the current situation – then we move forward with the plans to reach the vision. Otherwise everyone gets left behind. I wouldn’t be surprised if many of these ‘ideas’ have already been thought through by the government. It’s getting Australia up off it’s complacent butt and moving that is the trouble. I hope at least 2020 opens some people’s eyes.
80 onimod – well said
I’ve alluded to it often enough – ‘Change Management’
It’s not something new and it’s hardly a lefty construct.
I would have thought Mr Bolt would be a good enough journo to at least enquire about it but apparently not.
Hopefully it’ll avoid me rabbitting on about it. Go on, type it in to google.
Here’s 3 that I found off the first page that give a quick understanding:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Change_management_(people)
http://www.businessballs.com/organizationalchange.htm
http://home.att.net/~nickols/change.htm
80 – Barry Hall actions probably shouldn’t be discussed here (but I thought 9 weeks would have been better).
My point about actions is the government is going to pretend to listen, but they know what their goals are and are not going to be changed. I suspect the results will reflect the current government goals. Give it a couple hours and we’ll see what the final result are.
If the question had been “how” and not “what” I would have said it would’ve been more productive. “How” is what I meant by actions.
83 – the 2020 sounds like change management 101. Maybe someone can give Bolter a copy of Kotter’s?
84 Blair –
There will be no final results in a couple of hours – read the links. It’s a process. We’re at the start and the population of Australia is a very big group.
So far it’s effectively following a tried and true and successful process. If it’s followed effectively, flexibly and shortcuts aren’t taken there’s no reason to think it won’t succeed as a process.
Sure the government has an agenda, but even they won’t have the power to deny the population their wishes if it gets serious. Workchoices is a prime example here.
These processes generally take large corporations years, and most participants don’t even realise what their involvement is in that process, or have the slightest understanding about what is really going on, but if they’re not involved the process will fail. For me, this is going to be fascinating to watch.
Go and buy a few books and have a crack at identifying your character type and role in the process (it’s not all bad!!)
From what i have seen on abc2 there are a lot of “ideals” presented….ie a fair and equitable society…..but what i havent seen much is actual “ideas”….how to get there….but i think if they had one of these summits every year, we’d eventualy get to the true new ideas…….
87 Kat
Experts of the change management process will tell you that too much detail at this stage is actually detrimental to the process long term. This obviously presents political problems for the government and the press who ‘need’ solutions ‘now’. If they can whether the storm of criticism they’ll actually be better off.
There will definitely be more summits as the knowledge and detail are fleshed out by smaller groups.
Have a look at the simple roadmaps in the links and have look for more stuff through google. Spread those maps out over an absolute minimum of 2-3 years and it’ll give you some idea of the length of time required to get through the unfreeze, change and refreeze.
It’s also worth pointing out that these processes and body of thought has been well developed since the 60’s.
‘Future Shock’ by Alvin Toffler is a good read too – we’re already feeling a good deal of it, but if we don’t act it’s going to get worse.
If you don’t short change the process it won’t short change you.
Ok so we have established that it is a process with a little sparkle of celebs to get the general interest mixed with high profile influencers who are getting a little buy in too. Do you think people will ‘get it’ and let the rest of the process unfold?
I am wondering how Rudd will fufil the gen Y style need for instant graification. What does he have up his sleave? I will certainly stay tuned… Almost as good as watching West Wing.
Link from front page of the age isn’t working… Grrr
Dissent in 2020 ranks
1:52pm | Some 2020 summit delegates angry their ideas are going unheard.
I think the Republic should be brought on in a 3 step process.
1) At the next election (Say late 2009) we vote for the question “Do you want Australia to become a Republic sometime in the future?” We vote either YES or NO.
If the NO vote wins, the issue would be dead for 50 – 100 years.
If the YES vote wins:
2) We then hold a series of constitutional conventions every 8 or 9 months over the next parliamentary term. The goal of the conventions would be to develop 3 substantially different models (e.g. minimal Bob Carr model, direct election, and some hybrid model. The model that was rejected last time (2/3 joint sitting of parliament approval) wouldn’t be an option.).
3) At the following general election (held in roughly 2012). We vote on the models via a plebiscite with OPTIONAL PREFERENTIAL VOTING for the three models. If a voter only wants to vote for one model, that is all they have to do, otherwise they mark the paper in order of preference.
Whichever model achieves the most 1st and 2nd preference votes wins. And comes into effect on January 1 (or maybe January 26th) of the following year.
I think that refers to some religious leaders disappointed that child abuse wasn’t on the communities agenda.
I would rephrase 1) as: In the future do you want Australia to become a republic?
Cory Bernardi (Liberal Senator)
“They don’t even have a [Republic] model they agree on, do they want a presidential model like the United states do they want a committee model like Switzerland or do they want a Mugabe model, or a People’s Republic like China or North Korea ?”
To answer the senator’s question. I want a Republic model where Australia’s Head of State:
Could possibly be a Catholic
Could possibly be a Jew
Could possibly be a Muslim
Could possibly be an atheist
Isn’t more likely to be male due to a parliamentary act that enshrines gender discrimination.
Isn’t the head of a religion
Isn’t decided by birth
Lives in Australia
Is an Australian Citizen
President is elected by a simple majority vote. That gives him a power base for refusing to sign repugnant legislation (e.g. Pacific Solution) and for sacking a PM where that becomes necessary.
He has no executive powers, no similarity to US model, Mugabe etc. At most can use moral persuasion etc e.g. to get Hicks released from illegal detention in Cuba.
Similar I understand to the Irish model.
I voted against “Howard’s Flunky” in the last referendum and would vote against a “Rudd’s Flunky” then never ever vote for Labor ever again!
Showson – To change the consitution you need a referendum to change the constitution, and that needs to be a single question to be legal (OPV is not going to be acceptable). So your model would need a final referendum to change the constitution. And then you risk it falling over for the same reason that the 1999 model fell over (People didn’t like the detail). So you need to ask the public three times (something semi-biblical about that).
Not that it is not worth trying, but each time you ask there is a risk of rejection (except the middle one, which could produce a model that is only acceptable to a pularity of the population).
Of your list of excluded groups from head of state, I think legally only Catholics are excluded. And Prince Charles (George VII as he’ll be) plans on trying to remove himself for the role of head of the Church of England.
Andrew Bolt wants to emigrate.
Bon voyage.
Hi all. I was away, now I am back. No, BB..Melrose, SA.
I caught Kev’s closing address on ABC TV.
Did you catch Kev saying there will be a 2020 website up in a few hours? To which we may contribute.
I had time to ponder whilst travelling in my environmentally unfriendly way, so I will be taking him up on his offer.
What about you? After all, as someone mentioned, we can work out election outcomes.
Apart from his go at Nelson for his stupid remarks, Bolt was such a child on Insiders today. Shows that Rudd’s got under his skin. Go Kevin.
Chris Toolman was also hard to stomach, almost grimacing when trying to say something positive. David Spears on Sky not much better, nor suprisingly
89 Sarah
The inter generational mix is certainly one of the most interesting things to watch in change management these days. In my experience [I work in this field], the key to getting the different generations on board is in how they are engaged in the process.
To understand that, you need to understand each group’s motivations.
6 basic groups with rough birth dates and attributes:
Traditionalists [1920's - 1942] – Dislike change, want security, massive emphasis on morals, values and concistency. The way to engage these people is to appeal to their sense of civic duty, give them the respect that they feel they have earned and defer to their wisdom and knowledge.
Baby Boomers [1943 - 1953] – Live to work ethic, 1 x job for life, materialistic, status and symbols important, optomistic. The way to engage this group is to show them ‘what’s in it for them’, give them the economic arguments.
Jones’s [late boomers] [1954 - 1965] – ‘Keeping up with the Jones’s’, consumerism, striving to change the status quo, veers towards pessimism. The way to engage these people is similar to the Baby Boomers, but to show them what will happen if they do not change and the impact on other generations.
Gen X [1966 - 1978] – Disaffection with authority, short term relationships, rampant individuality, work to live mentality, cynicism. This group are the activists – to get to them you need to appeal to their individualism, mixed with humour, irreverence and the promise of speed.
Gen Y or Echo Boomers [1979 - 1995] – have been educated to work in teams, rarely like being separated from the group, very quick uptake or technology, used to the speed of change, live to live mentality [can't understand why they can't use Facebook at work - will blur the lines of social / familial / professional]. The way to engage this group is to talk to them, get their opinions in an interactive way, don’t frighten them with disaster talk, don’t dismiss them becuase they are young. The are most like the Traditionalists – their grandparents and so using that approach is also a good idea.
Millenials or Net Gen [1996 - ] – a little early to say, but hugely effected by September 11 and the 2nd Iraq war.
Sorry, a bit long, but just had to get it all out!
The report is already up. I have just read it. I will admit there is actually a “new” idea or two in there I do like. For example, Extending HELP (HECS) for those retraining later in life. I like that one. A lot of it is rubbish.
As much as I favour the idea of a republic, the idea of a presidential directly elected system a la USA sends shivers down my spine. Why on earth would anyone wish to inflict that upon us?
USA pres is in charge of the executive. Our pres wouldn’t be.
So is brainstorming good or bad – I think Kevin at least has given it a good bash.
In fact Onimod @ 83 explains the idea of “change management”.
I for one hated going into meetings with whiteboards, butcherpaper, playing leggo team building men – but what the heck, if it gets results
So what has the summit achieved. If according to reports that the big issue has been tax reform hence according to the Murdoch press and The Age it is reductions in the company and lessening the top mariginal rate and the scrapping of stamp duties than this is not reform it is going backwards, hence further handouts to the rich.
If the summiteers want many of their problems solved than in my mind the main solution is increasing the top rate of tax and the corporate rate to create fairer country and to bring in more money for education, health and infrastructure projects. If they can do it in Sweden and Norway hence create fairer and better societies why can’t we?
Here is a very good idea how about as Mayo Feral said the other day a Snowy Mountains Scheme with the building of Solar Energy Plants by issuing Government Bonds at current rates, bet you the super funds would buy them quickly..
We could export the power to Indonesia and beyond and help the Current Account…
Will not do it because the marginal seats are in coal areas, Latrobe and Hunter Valley and in Queenslands’ Gladstone region .. Time for Vision splendid instead of more handouts to the rich.
As much as if i favour a republic, to me it is not an issue at present and should be forget about, we have much more serious problems to solve.
Thomarse @ 95 -
President is elected by a simple majority vote. That gives him a power base for refusing to sign repugnant legislation (e.g. Pacific Solution)
Hmmm. Who defines what is “repugnant”?
I voted against “Howard’s Flunky” in the last referendum and would vote against a “Rudd’s Flunky” then never ever vote for Labor ever again!
And I couldn’t vote for a elected president, even on, say, the Irish model because elections guarantee a politician gets the gig. Not a Zelman Cowan or Ninian Stephen or William Deane or even Michael Jeffrey. Just Paul Haslucks and Bill Haydens. I actually thought both of the latter were okay, but please not a President John Winston Howard (and despite claiming to be a monarchist, I bet he’d put his hand up if he got half a chance)!!!!!!!!!
The problem with direct election is that you may end up with a Pauline Hanson type of person who really has no idea, because in this country many people do have no idea.
Direct elections are a bad way to go it would stuff up the constitution…the best option is to keep the system we’ve got, god the Canadians aren’t calling for a Republic so why the hell should we?
107 – Oops Michael Jeffery
I will say it again, don’t agree with your sentiments Glen, but a republic will not fix the problems we have in this country at present.
Oh Marky Mark and Glen, you poor conservatives. Here’s a new PM that has booted your hero out, bringing together people to discuss ideas, and you, like your counterparts in the MSM, try your best to talk it down eg. why not just start on the republic issue. How about encouraging your party to come up with some of its own ideas rather than just trashing Rudd’s. That is, if you want to come out of the wilderness. Nelson’s performance- first saying it was a good idea, then a shambes, then he had ideas but wasnt going to share them, sums up the predicament: no idea and no strategy to get out of the hole
But at least Canadians have their own flag at least, with no bloody union jack on it!
I never said it would solve the problems of this country, id rather save the money in becoming a Republic and putting it to ideas to fix the problems of health and education in this country. I am a Constitutional Monarchist, i assure you i do not advocate for a Republic!
! actually agree with you marky, before people should even think about a Republic they ought to fix health and education.
And we should get rid of all traces of colonialism. That would help our dealings with SE Asian nations.
Glad to see study of Asian languages was recommended at the summit. One of Costello’s really bad decisions to scrap them. (one of many, sorry Glen!)
Andrew, do you actually read the blogs.
I quoted earlier what seems to be coming out of this summit a precursor for tax reform which is according to ideolgical thinking a conservative way of looking at things, hence cuts to the top rate and corporate rate, this is not an idea it is a further handouts to the people to vote Liberal, and if you cut such taxes were do you get the money for hospitals, education and infrastructure.
My feeling about the summit is this it is about symbolism and publicity.
By the way Andrew i am a Labor Member, who believes in traditional Labor policies, the ones Chifley and Whitlam espoused, the current members seem to be frauds.
Thomarse yeah but they are sensible enough to realise the stupidity of changing their system of governance that has served them well for more than a century. They aren’t caught up in becoming a Republic and they are happy with their system, but we have all these elitists saying we should change, well i don’t agree!
Meant to say further handouts to the people who vote Liberal- sorry bloggers.
Glen, what’s a monarchist as opposed to a royalist as per Brendan? (he’s a monarchist but not a royalist) by all reports
Posted this at Chinadaily today;…talk about a tough crowd. They were taking the piss because we have a queen, and they don’t like Kevin much.
In 1999, Prime Minister, John Howard, a monarchist acquiesced to the request of the Republican Movement for a national referendum. A simple honest question might have been “Do you want Australia to become a Republic? Yes or No”. Instead, Howard made sure to split the “Yes” vote by including in the question how the new President would be elected.
“[i]Question 1
A Proposed Law: To alter the Constitution to establish the Commonwealth of Australia as a republic with the Queen and Governor-General being replaced by a President appointed by a two-thirds majority of the members of the Commonwealth Parliament.
Do you approve this proposed alteration?[/i]”
The result was [b]Yes[/b] 45.13% [b]No[/b] 54.87%
I would have voted “Yes” but I didn’t want to be stuck with a President effectively elected by the government, particularly not the then Prime Minister. So I voted “No”…….I was not alone.
For those that wanted a Republic but voted “No”, we were sure this was the only way to get the Republic we wanted. I am confident that Australia will have another referendum soon, especially now that John Howard is no longer P.M.
The question will not be penned by a monarchist.
Cille just because you support the current system does not make you a Monarchist! There are many against the Republic but who are not Monarchists.
I am a Constitutional Monarchist as i support the current Constitutional arrangements that we have in relation to our head of State and Government.
Glen, I wasn’t making trying to imply that supporting the current system makes you a monarchist.
What I was trying to determine was Nelson’s position, that being, as he stated, he is a monarchist and not a royalist.
I am fascinated with all this noise about teh ‘elites’.
Who, exactly, are the elites? Is it wealthy people? Famous people? People in influential positions? And what is wrong with having these so called elites? Are their opinions any less valid than everyday Joe’s? I suggest most of these people that are labelled elites are merely prominent and successful in their chosen fields of endeavour because of their hard work, talent, passion and application.
Hypothetical: If you held a summit on the future of sport in Australia – would you invite ‘elite’ sports people? Would you have a mix of Olympic greats as well as little aths and swimming teachers? Would you have administrators, physios, policy makers, fans, professionals and amateurs, marketing and publicity gurus as well?
In short would you have a mix of people not unlike the mix we saw this weekend – because all points of view are relevant – even those that are [tall poppy syndrome applied here] elites?
“A simple honest question might have been “Do you want Australia to become a Republic? Yes or No”. ”
I disagree. An honest approach will always spell out all the key consequences of a decision. If we become a republic with a directly elected president, then direct election is a key part of that change and that needs to be stated in the referendum question – a simplistic “monarchy or republic” wording is utterly inadequate.
I voted yes in 1999. But I will vote no to any change that introduces a directly elected president.
marky mark i recognise that you are not conservative. sorry to insult you that way! I lumped you in with them due to your negativity
dyno, the government has repeatedly indicated it will be two stage process, as it should be. the first question, republic yes or no, and the next, the model. this will get the republic up, as opposed to Howard’s question engineered to get a negative result
Andrew @ 126,
That is an intellectually dishonest approach in my view.
And I’m far from convinced that it’s the best way to get the republic up, either. After all only the second stage will be binding (at least I assume this is the case) so there may well be people who vote yes to the plebescite, but no to the referendum when the fine print is unveiled (and yes, I could easily be one of them, if the govt puts up a silly model for the republic).
As is well documented elsewhere, Minchin is very proud that the Monarchists gazumped the referendum by loading the question last time…..setting he and Allbull on the war path forever more!
#113 Thomarse says
“But at least Canadians have their own flag at least, with no bloody union jack on it!”
That bloody symbol on the top left side of the flag must go IMHO. Quite often when I show the Aussie flag to my primary school students here in China quite a few of them say its ‘the English (British) flag’. And it is very difficult to explain why the Union Jack is still on the flag of a soverign nation. Perception is reality, and the reality is that many Asians think Australia is still influenced or controlled by The UK. The canadians had the right idea.
Regarding the republic; even though I voted against the terrible model put up at the referendum I do want Australia to become a republic, but there are two good points that have been made,
#109 Glen “Direct elections are a bad way to go it would stuff up the constitution…the best option is to keep the system we’ve got”
#106 marky Mark “As much as if i favour a republic, to me it is not an issue at present and should be forget about, we have much more serious problems to solve.”
Glen is correct the system we got is pretty good (not perfect) and MM is spot on when he says Australia has much more important things to worry about at the moment. The Queen even though she is technically our head of state has no involvement , inclination, interest or power to meddle in our countries affairs. She is essentially symbolic. Maybe we as a nation should make some symbolic actions too. Moving the Union Jack of our flag, minting coins without the queens image on in, removing oaths to the Queen and removing the prefix Royal from certain names (eg Royal Australian Air Force). Then the Queen will fade from view and our head of state becomes the GG, eventually the GG becomes the president by a simple name change. Finally we can have a referendum when we have all forgotten we had a Queen/King in the first place.
Andrew,
The point of the process should not be “to get the republic up”. The point should be to express the people’s will.
What a lot of republicans overlook is that there are actually three models in play here, it’s not just republic v monarchy. The three models are (broadly):
A. Status quo
B. Republic with president chosen by PM/Parliament
C. Republic with directly elected president.
Model B has more in common, in many ways, with Model A than it does with Model C.
My personal view is that Model B is by far the best but I would prefer a continuation of Model A to the introduction of Model C.
I think the choice between the current constitutional system and a republic involves prior choices: do you support the current division of power between the parliament and the executive? Would you like the parliament to have more powers – including express powers to appoint and remove the head of state – or would you like the executive to have more powers – including power to refuse to follow the direction of the parliament? When you know the answers to these questions, you can decide whether to stick with the status quo or change the system, and you will know what kind of change is acceptable.
Personally, I am more afraid of the further concentration of power than of the status quo. Legislatures have a poor record of protecting the rights of citizens, but executives have even worse records.
I care enough about my civil rights and judicial independance to be very, very dubious about change. Does this make me a reactionary? Or a classical parliamentiary democrat?
The onus is on proponents of change to figure these things out and make the arguments. So far, they have not done enough to convince themselves or others that constitutional change is both desirable and feasible.
No Andrew it was not what i would an insult, but kind regards nonetheless. I am also a republic just do not see it as the most important issue at present.
Housing and Climate Change should demand attention.
We have people struggling to find affordable housing and a country which is refusing to say that coal is a problem.
Look at the Murray at the moment in South Australia, their are significant probs regarding toxicity and if this gets any worse it could have dire consequences for towns along the Murray and for Adelaides’ drinking water. The environment is a pressing issue not this republic.
blindoptimist @ 131,
I think these are real concerns, much more important than all the posturing that goes on about it somehow being “undemocratic” to have a constitutional monarch (what a lot of hogwash that is!).
And I agree that legislatures are better placed than the executive to protect the rule of law and people’s rights generally.
Nevertheless I think a foreign head of state is a major anomaly and I thought the 1999 proposal was about as good as republic models are likely to get, so I voted yes. I fear the next one that gets put forward won’t be nearly as good, but hopefully I’ll be proved wrong.
At the moment, I would have to say that I am in the “Minimalist” camp in regards to the Republic. If you want to have a direct election model, have a look at what is happening in the US at the moment – already Obama and Clinton have spent over $100m each just to get their party’s nomination for the Presidency.
More importantly, however, is that if a direct election model gets up, the whole spectre of Australian constitutional law will change. Most of our constitution is based around the notion of the Westminster system of government (eg, prerogative powers reserved for the GG, no explicit mention of the PM or the Cabinet). To switch to a direct election model, the powers of the President would have to be explicitly defined and the powers of the Parliament/Cabinet would also have to be defined. Additionally, the separation of powers between the Executive and the Legislature (already blurry at best) would be muddied even further.
That said, I do agree with marky mark and Glen (a rare occurrence for both for me). There are several more pressing issues at the moment than the Republic – infrastructure, the environment, the global financial crisis. We need to sort these issues out first before we can concentrate on stuff like the Republic (we probably also need to await the beginning of the reign of King Charles IV before the referendum has a chance to pass…)
And finally, as a side note, I saw this in sinowestie’s post @ 129 “Perception is reality”. Ah, yes, the Swing Lowe theory of politics has now gone international!!!
Thomarse. Heres a real aussie flag that was designed by a Canadian. Its the one I fly! – http://www.ausflag.com.au/flags/eureka.html
We are getting a bit hung up here on how we appoint/elect a president if/when we become a republic. Sure, the republic referendum was lost due to differences of opinion about how we appoint a president. Could be solved by not having one. Do we need a president? Can’t we have a republic by simply dispensing with vice-regal offices?
Tim Fischer – you gotta love him. I nominate him for the 2020 Summit Mixed Metaphor Award:
…..The group’s co-chair Tim Fischer, told the other delegates they also want to see standardisation of the different rules and regulations.
“This includes uniform regulation, licensing, standards and enforcement for transport – both road and rail and agriculture,” he said.
“It includes the regulatory reforms necessary to remove those wrinkles, that’s not necessarily decoupling a trailer at a border, but it is a raft of wrinkles that add to the cost burdens of all Australians.”…
A RAFT OF WRINKLES???
And while I do think there are some very good ideas coming out of the summit, I have been too often exposed to butchers’ paper and facilitators to be able to suppress my concern that Rudd is a captive of management-speak.
I suggest that the 1000 delegates now be requested to “de-brief” with a giant game of paintball.
#125 Aussieguru01
Yes that is a real Aussie flag, charged with meaning and symbolism. If there is a new Aussie flag it should have the Southern Cross on it and NOT be green and gold with kangaroos and boomerangs
Winston@136,
Agreed,
When was the last time a president would have been needed because a queen or G.G. were indispensable? And was it more recently than the last time the G.G. screwed with our democracy?
marky mark Rudd has repeatedly said that the republic was not a first-order issue. He agrees with you
The problem with the republican debate is that there will always be the problem with ‘The president’. When people think of a president they usually think of the US variety. Yes I know there are many varieties of President around the world but ultimately many people will asociate that particular office with the American variety which no rational Australian would ever embrace.
There’s no way that the election of a president will ever get up in a future referendum. Those oposed to a republic will have a field day pointing out the cost involved and how that money could be better put to use thereby scaring off a large proportion of the electorate. Anybody thinking we should go down this path is deluding themselves.
But for the interference of the group proposing the direct election model last time the minimal approach may have won the day. As I have pointed out previously the monarchists used the argument that if you wanted to vote for the president then vote no. This combined with the dyed in the wood monarchist vote was probably enough to lose the referendum. If I remember rightly, polls conducted for some time before the referendum were more than marginally in favour of a republic when respondents were asked simply “do you think Australia should become a republic”. However when the direct vote group in their wisdom (Clem Jones was at the forefront of this group) decided to be involved that ended any chance of the referendum getting up.
It is pretty obvious from some of the offerings in this post that there a variety of views as to how a republic should come about but IMHO the more models (some more complicated than others) that are put to the people the less chance there is of a republic getting up. The electorate, for better or worse, just will not agree to wholesale changes to the constitution notwithstanding the vast majority have no idea what is in the constitution or that it was framed back in the horse and buggy eraand probably needs rewriting anyway. The ARM’s model last time which was the minimal approach (correct me if I’m wrong) may just be simple enough for a majority to vote yes. In other words KISS.
I have always believed (rightly or wrongly) that Turnbull was a passionate believer in the republican cause and it was not his fault that the referendum was lost. Other posters here seem to think otherwise. Is this simply sour grapes because he is now a liberal politician and probable leader of the liberals when he wasn’t at the time of the referndum?
The 20/20 Summit is the biggest waste of money i have seen any Government make. It is not a fair cross section of Australian society. The delegates were chosen by the ALP Government, were chosen by Rudd and his Ministers and Labor MPs chaired the various groups at the Summit. You had a room where only 1 person said they were against a Republic, when we know the figure in the ‘real’ world is more like 50/50. You had Maxine McKew talk about ‘Kevin Performance Indicators’ for gods sakes! How fair and balanced is it to have an ALP member (minder) to co chair just about every pool!
This was not an impartial talk fest, this was a group of like minded elitist left wingers who basically wrote out what the ALP wanted as their policy platform for the future.
This is an absolute disgrace, this was not an Australian Summit this was an ALP Junket talk fest to puff themselves up and boost their egos. He even had journalists saluting him saying how he’s a man of the people and how they wished him a long and happy time as Prime Minister, especially those who got invites.
This unelected assembly is a left wing elitist, undemocratic project, purely designed in an anti-conservative agenda, pro-Republic, pro-Bill of Rights, pro-Aboriginal Treaty ect.
This is Rudd for you, he’ll make you think he’s doing something but he’s doing nothing. It’s like Seinfeld, the Rudd Government is like a never ending Seinfeld episode it’s a show about nothing! What’s worse about the Rudd Government is that it is not at all funny, not even with a couple of idiots like Swan and Garrett running amok.
I’d have been far more happy to see Rudd give the money used to pay for this ridiculous waste of time to charity or the poor, instead of to ingratiate a bunch of chest beating, ego driven, die hard left wing elitists!
And yes i think it was a disgrace that Brendan Nelson went!
130 – The people who want Model A like Model B better than Model C. The people who want model C, see Model B as being the same as Model A. When model B was put up, both Model A and C followers voted against it and it failed. Time for a model D….. a lucky dip…. if works for the QLD Liberal party, why not?
Or we could get one of the Queen’s grandkids to come and be our own monarch…In that case, I vote for Zara Phillips…
143 Glen – sorry Glen couldn’t find anything in this tirade to agree with. Total unadulterated, unproven pap. Why not just direct me to the Liberal Party handbook? Oh, that’s right they participated didn’t they?
Whether you liked it or not Glen it was a success. Hang on, I think I just worked out your problem. It was too successful. The more you produce tirade’s against it the more I’m convinced of it.
Wow Glen, the biggest waste of money you’ve ever seen!!!
Try the $40 mill spent on advertising Workchoices.
My understanding is that it didn’t cost much at all. Attendees even had to pay for their own accommodation.
I’m sure you can do better than that.
The realisation of a republic is a long way off as yet. I do like Bob Carr’s idea though.
Glen, if John Howard has a similar talk fest stacked with conservatives would you have a similar opinion?
The KPI line was a disgrace. McKew might discover that one comes back to bite her in the backside. Sure we are in love with Kevin at the moment but in six years time he could be on the nose. Cults of personality can come apart.
I am naturally cynical about these sorts of shows (i.e. the 2020 summit). But if you think about it, Rudd has shown he’s not afraid to take risks. He’s asked questions that he doesn’t know the answers to – a cardinal sin for politicians. I think this event is more significant than most realise and the difference between the Rudd and Howard Governments couldn’t be more obvious.
Am I supposed to believe that Malcolm Turnbull didn’t deliberately collaborate with Howard to present the least liked referendum option in return for Liberal reselection in 2003?
http://www.newspoll.com.au/image_uploads/cgi-lib.1278.1.1101republic.pdf
Sinowestie @129 -
The Queen even though she is technically our head of state has no involvement , inclination, interest or power to meddle in our countries affairs. She is essentially symbolic.
Not so sure about that. She is our Head of State, and Australia, according to our constitution belongs to the Crown, ie. her. To quote:
[The states] “have agreed to unite in one indissoluble Federal Commonwealth under the Crown of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland”
Furthermore, the Constitution sets out the oath of allegiance sworn by all ADF personnel (and others) thus:
1) I, XXX, do solemnly and sincerely affirm and declare that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Victoria, Her Heirs and successors according to law.
2) The name of the King or Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland for the time being is to be substituted from time to time.
So what will the ADF do if HRH phones the Chief Defence Force and orders him to blow up Parliament House while both house are in session?
True, ATM, that is very much a hypothetical question, but who knows where the future will lead Australia and GB. We could well end up on opposite sides of a conflict. Indeed, we might have in WW2 if the reputedly Nazi sympathizing Edward VIII hadn’t abdicated in 1936. The monarchists owe a huge debt to the republican born and bred Wallis Simpson!
Why does our head of state have to be called a president? Why not another name? Maybe Federal-Governor, Constitutional-Administrator, Commonwealth-General or any other benign title that someone can think of. I think the word president carries a title that polarises people. People think of a president and they think of a figure with political influence to rival the PM. That is a major stumbling block to a constitutional change.
Of course many people also want a greater say in the appointment of a GG, or president, or whatever. The current method of appointment by the PM ensures a degree of disconnect between the head of state and the people, regardless of the merit of the appointment. Some sort of electoral involvement would ensure greater knowledge about the appointee and more relevence in the position for the population at large. This was one of the problems with the model proposed in the 1999 Referendum and was used as a wedge by those proposing the NO vote that included both monarchists and republicans.
So, in my opinion, we need a head of state not called the president, whose appointment is partly or completely determined by the people, but whose role will not cause a political vacuum to undermine the PM or the parliament.
No wonder the process of constitutional change is difficult. A minimilist model would be unlikely to succeed if the above assumptions are correct.
What’s the KPI disgrace?
If we wait for the ‘right’ time, we’ll never get to be a republic – there’ll always be bigger, more important issues to deal with.
What are we meant to wait for, exactly? A constitutional crisis to come along? Wouldn’t that be leaving it all a bit late?
Glen at 143.
‘I’d have been far more happy to see Rudd give the money used to pay for this ridiculous waste of time to charity or the poor, instead of to ingratiate a bunch of chest beating, ego driven, die hard left wing elitists’!
• I have just had to cough up $400 for annual site hosting, so now would be a good time for those who like to make the occasional donation.
Could not resist.
She suggested a series of “Kevin Performance Indicators”. Disgrace was maybe a little hard. “Extremely foolish” is perhaps better. It was about rating people on how “Kevin” they are.
I note this morning Bolt described the summit as an absolute disgrace. How dare we listen to a group of Australians give their views. That’s not what democracy is all about. It’s about voting once every 3 or 4 years then forgetting about politics.
Gary Bruce, for your own peace of mind stop reading Andrew Bolt. I did a year ago and I feel much better for it.
Thanks B. S. It does sound strange and a little indulgent. I think she must have been carried away by the occasion. I’m still not sure what she meant though. I will say that the way the Libs still drool over Howard and his legacy is just as vomit inducing. Did anyone see Brandis being interviewed on Sky? Sickening.
Actually Winston I saw him on “Insiders”. I like that show. Bolt, like Glen, is over the top at the moment. A true indication of how successful Rudd is at the moment. They just hate it.
Detail of pdf@151 The Australian/Newspoll History Lesson
Preferences for a republic if Australia decided to become a republic
PRESIDENT DIRECTLY ELECTED BY THE PEOPLE 79%
PRESIDENT APPOINTED BY PARLIAMENT 18%
UNCOMMITTED 3%
And that’s why “directly elected” wasn’t on the ballot.
I used to read Bolt at times and even contribute to his blog. I gave both the flick mid last year.
Sceptic @ 153
how about:
Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of Australia…
glen the absolute disgrace is not the summit, it’s your reaction to it
Davo #164
From October the incumbent would need to be called Lady Protector of the Commonwealth of Australia.
Mind you it sounds a little more polished that the “Top Dog” or the “Big Cheese”.
Top Banana
and as for my comments on Bolt, your overraction Glen shows how rattled you are by Rudd
I agree that Glen’s comments are an over-reaction.
However surely even the strongest Labor supporter would have to admit that this affair had a fair bit of self-indulgence about it?
Glen: what a lot of sour grapes! Mate, I’d get used to being in the wilderness, your lot are stuck in quicksand and going backwards under the leadership of Nelson.
God Almighty read this rubbish…
http://blogs.theaustralian.news.com.au/janetalbrechtsen/index.php/theaustralian/comments/the_2020_summit_symbolism_or_substance/
she is one wrinkly, nasty, conservative bitch!
davo,
Don’t you think (at least according to what we have read so far) that there is a lot in what she says?
I’m pretty disappointed in the summit – I think a lot of it was self-indulgent twaddle, according to what has been reported (although I am open to the idea that the media just focussed on the shallow bits).
To Glen @143 and Crikey Whitey @ 156
I agree with you that what has been the 2020 talkfest has been a ridiculous sham.
The participants will all feel the cosey glow of being the brightest of the brightest, networking for 2 days. Hey, great to be a participant, thanks kevin.
So what happens now?
What structures were established to ensure this all meant something. It feels to me like a second rate repeat of the Republican get together Howard organised.
At least then we all went through the charade of a referendum!
Am I seeing another sham where the media are responding with enthusiasm because the participants are in the glow?
Kevin Rudd appears to me to be a true diplomat, lots of talk no real action.
That aside did we all notice Julia Gillard acquiesce to her department and follow the merit pay issue for teachers with the states?
Interesting how the States now believe it is now worth investigating!
I said good riddance to Howard but the ALP lot were never going to be much better, till now I think they are worse because they have done nothing!
Davo at 171. In keeping with the ‘not click’ protocol, should it be she or another, a brief summation woud be welcome.
Thank you.
PS. I am in the business of developing wrinkles. Unsurprisingly, I am not happy that you would describe any person/female in the terms you have employed. Much as I do not share JA’s views.
Describe, if you would, Dennis Shanahan. Similarly.
Ah Andrew how typical, when you cannot get your head around the fact the 20/20 Summit was for all intent and purposes an ALP controlled Junket of left wing, ego centric, chest thumping elitists who like Rudd loves to get the attention of celebrities. The fact that this waste of money had at one point Hugh Jackman going around with a mic and singing songs with people just shows how much of a farce this thing really was.
chilli_sauce if you want a President who is elected by the people you support a US model, which i for one don’t. If we had to have a Head of State other than Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II then i would have them chosen by Parliament as this means they’ll have no real power and won’t take their position to their head! After all the President could just refuse to give assent to legislation and if party politics comes into it then a President could just block legislation (veto) and good luck getting 3/4s of Parliament backing it with a strong 2 party system in place!
Also what will happen to the States??? Will the Premier be called a Governor, what will State Governors be Called?? Who’ll give assent to legislation in the States??
Plus we’ll have to change the name of our defence forces….No longer RAAF but AAF and no longer RAN but AN…that is a disgrace IMHO.
The only people who really care about having a Republic are left wing elitists who can’t stand having a British Monarch as our Head of State and overlook the fact that we’ve had 1 ‘constitutional crisis’ in over 100 years of Federation and not one civil war, yet they say we need to completely overhaul our System of Governance just so they can sleep better at night.
And Maxine McKew has just shown was a Rudd mouthpiece she is, KPI i mean seriously she’s over rated as an MP the only thing she could hang her hat on would be unseated a PM and the PM did most of the work for her in that regard! Those comments will come back to haunt her, as they could backfire in later years and also because she displayed with those comments how blatantly left wing the Summit/Junket was!
You say ohhh the UK could tell our ADF to kill all our Parliamentarians…how stupid…we’ll what about the safety of having an independent arbiter who could if need be dismiss a despot or dictator from taking power in Australia????
Gary for your information Rudd isn’t successful he’s achieved nothing out of this Junket except some snap shots of him and Cate Blanchett! It’s just another of the several hundred reviews he is making because he can’t come up with any ideas of his own! God he even stole ideas from Tony Blair and a State Labor Government…how’s that being a success he was a copy cat as opposition leader and he’s a copy cat as PM!
Not me, Colin!! Strongest of protests!!!
I await your retraction.
Crikey Whitey.
Crickey you’ve just been suckered in by Rudd and his PR team, this Summit was a Junket and you know it!
Dennis Shanannanananannanhan is Truly Mummified compared to most conservative reporters….
Janet Albrechtsen sums up the 20/20 Junket in three sentences….
“What a surprise. The headline big new ideas for the new century are all from the Young Labor wish list from the last century.”
“…when summits are stacked with like-minded people in order to achieve the appearance of public acclaim for contentious ideas, the air has a distinctly stale odour.”
http://blogs.theaustralian.news.com.au/janetalbrechtsen/index.php/theaustralian/comments/the_2020_summit_symbolism_or_substance/
Glen,
Why couldn’t the RAAF stand for “Republic of Australia Air Force”. Same for the RAN. “Republic of Australia Navy”, etc.
I see. I was suckered. Colin is Glen. Don’t worry about the retraction.
Sorry, on the other hand, will do.
Thank you.
Hello Scorpio, as you are there. I am conscious of the 28th as earlier talked of. Same as?
Yeah, Glen. I bet if a poll was taken of the 1000 people at the summit and they were asked how many have been or are Members of Young Labor, if there was any more than half a dozen it would be amazing.
Tim Fisher and Co., Young Labor. Yeah, I like that. lol
Sorry to say, Glen, but sour grapes are indeed bitter. I think your problem is you are worried that an even bigger gulf will open up between Rudd Labor and Nelson Liberals now that Rudd has shown that he is not content to just rest on his laurels but is prepared to be imaginative and adventurous during his tenure.
What a breath of fresh air which has been brought in to the Australian Political System.
Glen@175
“I would have them chosen by Parliament ”
So now you’re our benevolent dictator?
In 1998 Howard was our “benevolent” dictator appointing half the Constitutional Convention and allowing the other half to be elected; knowing full well enough ACMs would be elected from the community to guarantee no popular Republican model would find it’s way on the ballot.
CC Hansard
http://www.aph.gov.au/Hansard/conv/con1302.pdf
Hi, Crikey.
Yeah, still on. Qld Health will be paying to fly me to Brisbane and back just to see a Specialist.
I should be having a MRI and some other tests done there, but cannot understand why they cannot be done here and be sent to the Specialist by the internet.
Hope Rudd is successful with his proposal for a major upgrade of the country’s Broadband system.
Also hope nothing serious is found and it can be easily fixed. It will be almost 2 years to the day that I have suffered from this now. There is still a lot of work to do in upgrading Australia’s Health System.
I will never forgive Howard for becoming captive to the AMA & Specialist Colleges in not allowing enough GP’s & Specialists to be trained to cover for a fast growing & aging population. No one else should forgive him either.
Aren’t you forgetting one thing Scorpio?
It was a hand-picked conference of 1002 delegates which had 10 Labor government ministerial chairmen! It was only natural that they’d come up with the future ALP’s agenda!
Wow 1 person out of 1002 people yeah that’s representative!
Rudd will end up like Keating a dead duck if he continues with this elitist agenda when he promised to fix grocery and petrol prices!
Why should i care about the polls right now and the gap between ALP and Coalition especially when Rudd hasn’t made a tough decision in Government yet and when we’re coming off a bad defeat? Personally i don’t!
Rudd has rested on his laurels he’s done nothing so far and he a politician like Howard and Keating before him using this bogus war on binge drinking after his wife got into trouble over still owning businesses! Something again he stole from Blair who did the same thing when his wife got into trouble with business dealings!
It’s nice to see Rudd’s PR team has done its job on you Scoprio…
Hate to break it to you but there is no such thing as Rudd Labor…its Rudd, Rudd, Rudd, Rudd, Rudd, Rudd, Rudd, Rudd, Rudd, Rudd, Rudd, Rudd, Rudd, Rudd, Rudd, Rudd, Rudd, Rudd!
A personality cult as bad as Rudd is forming is sad and it will eventually hurt the ALP beyond repair…
Rudd is still a copy cat Scorpio he’s soo full of fresh air he stole a British Labor policy!
One of the saving graces of the present system of appointing governors and governors general is the ease with which they can be removed. Think of Hollingsworth and Butler. Here one minute, gone the next. No crisis of anguish. No explanations or contests: just painlessly relieved of their rubber stamps. A good system, I think…
You’re foaming at the mouth, Glen. Your mob are seriously out of their depth. Rudd just looks better and better.
Sorry Glen, but I am captive to nobody or no ideology. I am of above average intelligence and can think for myself quite well, thank you.
In fact, in my youth, I was a member of the YACP (now Young Nats), but have always voted Labor since 1972, because that Party confirms to my social aspirations.
Check this out. It covers both the Queen/Republic and just what people out in the wider community think of Kevin Rudd, PM and his 2020 summit.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23571391-2702,00.html
No i am the only person not caught up in this stupid Rudd personality cult.
I am the only voice of decent as you all can’t see past Rudd’s PR machine!
Rudd is full of hot air!
You know, Scorpio, the negative Glen types annoy me so much.
In the journey within the Melrose ambit, I did hear certain of the 2020 proceedings. As I regarded our beautiful country, devastated in so many ways.
I sighed with relief that the burden of the backward Howard years is behind us, and reflected upon the dead hand of that decade.
And felt so relieved that we have embarked upon a new journey, a kind of hope. Hope for the future.
Not that I am not concerned, because who knows what or even how we can solve our huge water and other problems, but at least we can, belatedly, begin.
It kind of broke my heart to go to Melrose. To again see the devastation wrought upon the aboriginal people, the ruination, really, of the country. The local Nurkuna, so beautiful, so destroyed. So determined despite this ghastly havoc.
If any kind of vision, which is actually love and recognition, could help to change this past, I am all for it.
And that goes for any kind of 2020. And all it may mean.
Personality cult, Glen? You are obviously still experiencing grief at the loss of John Howard. This is natural. You obviously revered him and personally identified with him. It is normal too feel angry too, and to want to lash out at the world. These feelings will abate in time. It might help if you put a photo of the one you are missing in a prominent place in your house, or plant a tree in memory of him.The sense of loss is an important experience for you, Glen, and you should be gentle with yourself and those around you. You should not blame yourself or others for these feelings, but seek to grow as an individual by learning what loss is….please feel free to respond any time…
Okey doke, Ten Four, Scorpio at 185.
Fingers crossed. Could of course, come to Flinders!!!.
Hardly i am only experiencing grief at the fact Rudd’s personality cult has completely overridden your once sharp political nous!
191 CW,
Sorry but I have yet to see the evidence that this summit was a good thing. Nearly all the main topics (as reported by the press) were well-known, long-held Labor aspirations. Fine, but we hardly need an elaborate summit for them to just get on with it, do we?
If that makes me negative, so be it. I’m just calling it as I see it. Don’t see why you should be annoyed at that. Disagreement is what makes democracy vibrant.
Glen, I bear you no malice just because you are a true-blue supporter of your strand of politics. However, you should be prepared to realise that Kevin Rudd is a more than capable political operator with a very talented front bench.
It is more than possible that he will continue to have a favorable relationship with the Australian electorate for some considerable time.
While ever Rudd & his team are dining at the table with fine food and silverware, the other mob will be left scrambling for scraps and crumbs on the floor.
I hope that you are able to overcome this feeling of denial and resentment at the loss of your side to the reins of Government. They deserved to lose and Labor deserve to be given a chance to show what they can do.
Already, after only 4 months, people are feeling more optimistic about the future and are more than willing to see just what Rudd can do. There is no doubt that he has strong feelings about which way he would like to see the country progress and prosper.
I, and many of my fellow country men & women, hope he is successful in his endevours.
Oh Glen, denial is very common too. You could try meditating, it might help quell your regrets….
Well in that case Rudd’s hot air is sure getting a rise out of you!
Crikey, “Could of course, come to Flinders!!!.”
Yeah, I should have checked that out when I was down there last Christmas.
It may have saved a lot of grief and suffering.
Folks,
I just can’t believe that so many of you think 2020 was a triumph.
Glen has exaggerated 2020’s ills, but even so, this weekend was a low point in my view. Not necessarily a bad idea, but very disappointing in the execution.
Glen Says: @ 194 meant to say, “Hardly i am only experiencing grief at the fact Rudd’s personality cult has completely overridden “any chance for Brendan Nelson to climb back into double figures in the polls.
“….once sharp political nous”?? Do you think I’ve lost my nous? You could be right. I know I left it somewhere. With my eye patch, perhaps. I had it when I came in. Perhaps it’s fallen down the back of the couch. I’ll have to get a new one when I go to the chemist…
But what about you, Glen. You seem so cranky, lately. I could get you a new nous too, if you like.
And what about Rudd’s own Parliamentary Sec advancing the idea of KPIs? If a Howard acolyte had done something like this when he was PM, the average PBer would have been apoplectic.
Just appalling.
It’s not just me – this is what Annabel Crabb thought:
“PICTURE Vatican II, with Kevin Rudd playing the role of God.
That’ll give you a fair idea of what this weekend was like.
Much like God at Vatican II, the Prime Minister was not – technically – a participant at the 2020 Summit. But to pretend that the event was not all about him would be absurd.”
http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/annabel-crabb/2008/04/20/1208629730745.html
Tchh, Dyno.
Scorpio, I had thought of suggesting the Adelaide option, and that was somewhat before we became aware of the ever so remarkable coincidence. But being a bit of a shy type, I didn’t.
Could still work though, if the system there fails.
Dyno Says: @ 200,
Dyno, I cant remember seeing to many comments about 2020 being a triumph as such.
One thing it has achieved though is it has stimulated people’s imaginations from without a broad cross section of the population and I think you will see ideas being canvassed for some considerable time yet.
This, to my mind is a good thing, because it takes us back to a time when the imagination and resourcefulness of the average person in this country has led to a considerable number of extraordinary achievements in a wide variety of fields.
It is no bad thing to fertilise and cultivate this resourcefulness to further advance us as a modern and caring society.
Crikey, I will keep that in mind and may take it up further with you down the track. Thanks for your thoughts.
“God he even stole ideas from Tony Blair and a State Labor Government…how’s that being a success he was a copy cat as opposition leader and he’s a copy cat as PM!” What’s this insistance that every idea has to be original or new otherwise it is no good. That’s just plain nit picky. Julie Bishop admits she also suggested an education idea last year straight from the same book ie companies sponsoring schools. So what?
Annabel Crabb is not a Rudd supporter and never has been. She almost says the name Kevin Rudd through gritted teeth. I wouldn’t have expected anything else from her. Have you noticed how those who opposed the summit in the first place are now finding ways to criticise it, to put it down, when in fact it worked very well.
Dyno, journalists and commentators are going to be sifting through the wash up of the summit for quite a while yet.
They are going to come up with a wide range of opinions, especially any that they consider personally as a negative, even if the majority of the population disagree.
It’s all to do with selling newspapers etc and encouraging people to web sites to support advertisers. Their opinions in the main, mean stuff all really.
What is important is how the person out on the street perceives the summit results and a constant slant on perceived negatives by commentators (or bloggers), won’t change people’s basic opinion of the worth or otherwise of the summit.
I observe the failure of contrition or even observation, Glen and Colin. Typical. The exact type of thing that had your kind chucked out of office.
Catchya, Scorpio. Going to sleep.
Dyno, I think many of us, being honest, would admit they did not have great expectations of this conference.
I was bemused when I heard of it, and doubted that on a practical level it would achieve any results.
But on a political level I came to the conclusion that it was a master stroke. It divided the opposition, made what passes for their leader look like a dithering fool, and drove the Liberal apparatchiks into a lathered frenzy, one from which they will not stop ranting illogically for weeks, and with each day that passes will make them look more desperate and irrelevant.
On a practical level this conference did no harm, gave the semblance, if not the actuality, of public involvement in decision making, and came up with at least a few ideas which were popularly acclaimed and bear investigation.
The cream on top of the cake for our Prime Minister however, was the photo of him sitting on the floor, free of pretention, and with an obvious air of humility and humanity. And this from the man perceived to have just returned from a triumphant diplomatic mission, in which he mixed and more than matched it with the leaders of the modern world.
I am no sycophantic supporter, but can recognize a pit of quicksand set up to trap the enemy when I see one, and this was a beauty, perfectly planned and executed.
No wonder ther is so much wailing and gnashing of teeth from Liberal Headquarters. What a bunch of ineffectual dunderheads. Just like the last three years of the previous Administration.
Fulvio Sammut,
Spot on! You have absolutely nailed it. Great post.
Another master stroke was ensuring that at least 200 or so delegates were of opposing political persuasion.
The fact that many of them have given glowing public, appraisal of the summit (Heather Ridout from the AIG etc), only gives it more credibility and shoots down any criticism from the far right.
Very hard for the neocon Libs to critisise their own.
A friend said that watching daytime “soap operas” was akin to believing that life was negative = depression. Watching “insiders” since Kevin decided against appearing during the election campaign is now so negative = depression. Not an early riser on Sundays, so have always taped Insiders. After this Sunday’s negative “claptrap” will no longer be recording. Such a shame as we require a positive and intelligent outlook from political commentators as to what’s happening in the Federal political sphere.
JC #215, agree with you about Insiders.
I am so sick of the smirking, smug, “we know better”, “everything is spin” style of that show.
They should rename it “Outsiders”. If ever there was a glaringingly obvious bunch of political losers bristling at their own irrelevance, it is them.
Yesterday’s episode was one of the worst I have seen, despite the once respectable Cassidy’s feeble attempts to inject some sort of rationality.
That poor bloke, he must be feeling awful lonely there at 9am on a Sunday holding his clipboard with the likes of Pies, Bolt and Milne for company, foisted on him by Janet and her cronies on the Board.
They will have a long wait for relevance. No wonder Rudd doesn’t want to be tainted by their negativity. I wouldn’t appear on any program that had Pies for a friend either. doing so would give it a legitimacy that it does not deserve.
175
Glen Says:
April 21st, 2008 at 12:52 am
Ah Andrew how typical, when you cannot get your head around the fact the 20/20 Summit was for all intent and purposes an ALP controlled Junket of left wing, ego centric, chest thumping elitists who like Rudd loves to get the attention of celebrities. The fact that this waste of money had at one point Hugh Jackman going around with a mic and singing songs with people just shows how much of a farce this thing really was.
chilli_sauce if you want a President who is elected by the people you support a US model, which i for one don’t.
HM did the Summit actually cost? The attendees paid own travel and accomodation so hardly a junket. I think the picture of 1000 people sitting down and discussing IDEAS was so great, such a light after the darkness of the dreadful Howard years that that alone made it worthwhile!
this elected Pres=USA model is a false argument since the US Pres is the head of the executive and NO ONE is suggesting that here. In fact, why not agree to continue to call the office ‘Governor General’
Please Glen, facts not crap please.
Yes, but wasn’t Julia great on Outsiders?
Re the blogs, reckon I have blown the ‘Heiner Affair’ apart on Pies blog, got called a bloody ignorant fool which I took as a great compliment.
Am thinking of contacting all the supposed signatories of the ‘jurists letter’ and asking:
did you write it?
Did you actually sign it?
Did you know the main fact (fraud) presented, that Heiner’s investigation was into sexual abuse claims was false, that it was strictly to be an investigation into a staff-management dispute
That it was NOT Rudd who ordered the shredding on one copy of the report?
For all of you calling the summit a favour, please, you need to go back and read the links on ‘cultural change’. If you don’t like the internet then buy some books.
It might be a failure in your eyes, and it might not have achieved all the aims of the cultural change team (and yes – I’d like to know who they actually are), but the basic slanging going on shows a poorly educated understating of what ‘cultural change’ is.
After you’ve done some reading, please reassess the weekend’s gathering and come up with a critique against the criterion of an initial cultural change meeting.
Several people posting are making themselves look, from a partially educated perspective, as very uneducated. You have to critique against what was actually attempted, not what you wish was attempted.
A large majority of Australia’s top 100 companies either are now, have or will undertake this very same process. One of the obvious ones is the company that donated a large chunk of change for the homeless. It was the NAB They themselves are the direct beneficiaries of this very same process and the donation can very much be seen as a vote of confidence in the government attempting the process.
I am disappointed with the practical success of this country in a daily basis. We need to be putting in processes in place that incrementally increase the daily practical achievements that this country. The weekend didn’t stop that, and might have helped long term.
Action is a process, not an outcome.
Also as Glynn Davis pointed out – ‘conversation is the essence of democracy’.
Please converse, but surely we can drive the debate in places like this up, not down.
@215
As an overseas viewer, I find the Insiders website adequate in terms of video replay. I still enjoy the “Rudd-haters” having to grit their teeth over Kevin’s ascension and Nelson’s failure to gain traction.
BB (216), well said. Especially like this phrase
glaringingly obvious bunch of political losers bristling at their own irrelevance,….
He he. They just can’t get over the fact that Rudd spurned their Royal command to appear on their show, bringing down their scorn and wrath, and yet he still won the election comfortably.
Newspoll tonight: Anyone willing to have a guess at the result?
Re B.F.Fairman @ 222: Newspoll prediction is 62-38 ALP
I’d be surprised if Brendan gets above single digits as preferred PM.
Does anyone know when the results/outcome of the 202 summit will be released? Or will we see no more than soundbites from this example of “binge thinking”?
Jeez boys, you really got poor old Glen cranked up last night, what a hoot! I wager he was frothing at the mouth
On a separate note copied this from Janet Allbitchsen’s site, does anyone know how long ABC Board members are appointed for, she must be up for renewal soon:
“Janet Albrechtsen writes a weekly column for The Australian. She is a member of the Foreign Affairs Council. In 2005, she was appointed a member of the Board of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.”
And please lay off Annabel Crabb, she is uber cute
I’ve been listening to Mitchell this morning on 3AW. They are doing their best to discredit the summit. Mitchell interviewed a person AW had chosen to go to the summit. Her concern was hospital waiting lists. She was rapt. She had spoken to the PM and Murdoch. Mitchell asked her questions looking for a negative so he asked her how the summit had changed anything in health. He quickly added “will it change anything in health in the future.” One day after the summit he is asking for results. These people are just desperate to nail Rudd to the wall.
Must say I like the sound of this from 2020, to my mind there is far too much duplication and waste in our current federalist system, time for the states to move out of the way in so many areas:
“New Federation Commission to completely review the roles and responsibilities of the three levels of government. The independent body would have the power to pursue constitutional and economic reform.”
My Newspoll tip:
TPP 61-39
PPM 75-8
Thomarse,
I think at least three of the “so-called” eminent jurists are “deceased” and the rest are Lib supporters who wouldn’t have been able to review all the available material relating to the Heiner affair anyway.
Their whole “Review” was nothing more than a stunt which reflects very poorly on any limited amount of credibility they had anyway.
Pies is nothing but a dangerous fool who may pay dearly for his obsessive campaign which has, at it’s core, the sole objective of the destruction and reputation of Kevin Rudd.
My Newspoll tip:
TPP 64-36
PPM 76-6
Socrates Says: @ 224,
[Does anyone know when the results/outcome of the 202 summit will be released?}
Interim Report is available Here.
http://australia2020.gov.au/report/index.cfm
228 Scorpio
That is what struck me about the list of ’signatories’
They are all old, retired and may have been conned into signing the letter.
But the letter states in bold that Heiner was investigating allegations of rape etc when he clearly and definitely was not–not a shred of proof or argument offered to support this bald statement. This is the main reason I doubt any of this was written by these dodderers. Also, the language of the letter was not lawyerlike/legalistic/jurisprudential in any way.
Be nice if I can expose this and blow Pies out the water,
The jurnos could smell a Rudd Junket a mile away and that’s what it was a Left Wing Junket purely created to meet the desired ends of Rudd himself.
This was not only a waste of money but a waste of time. And Nelson could have scored brownie points for not going and telling the rest of middle Australia what an elitist out of touch group of left wingers the delegates to the Summit were for the most part!
Newspoll…bah who cares!
I want a Gippsland specific poll done…
How was it a junket Glen when the participants paid their own expenses?
I used to have some respect for you, the humor displayed despite your party losing but christ man you are getting surly!
Must say I think 2020 was overall a great idea. I see absolutely nothing wrong in the government bringing together a group of interested people who after all paid their own way to attend (at least that was my understanding). Sure there may be some symbolism involved, but hey, symbolism is important too you know. I am sure that any extremist positions will be quietly obliterated by the hard-heads inside the Labor Party and we will see some very worthwhile innovations to come out of this.
The whole thing seems to have all the right wing fascist whackos out screaming for blood on some of the other blogs, seems they only like things that their ‘elites’ get invited to, and god knows we saw enough of that 1996-2007. Anything that enrages them gets my vote!
And like some others here, I do not have the republic high on my importance list, a new flag would be great though.
Kevin should keep the republic issue on ice till Turnbull is leader and an election is looming. Conservatives love good wedging…
“A junket a day keeps the tax man away”. The tory moto I believe. Been to any openings of envelopes lately Glen?
Like many conservatives Glen is becoming more and more shrill as Rudd becomes more and more popular.
Yes Rx, agree, what a nice little wedge that would be too, I am sure the Ruddster has that one prepackaged for delivery.
Another conservative government bites the dust. The worlds longest running conservative government is being thrown out in Paraguay, after being in power since 1947. Since George Bush has been in power the right wing dictatorships have been comprehensibly routed in South America. The only one still standing is Columbia. Most of the right wing death squads have disappeared. They have thrown out the world bank and set up there own South American bank. They have also stopped the strip mining of their resources. We must thank George Bush for tying up the Americans in Iraq so that democracy could come to South America.
http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSN2032953620080421
Regarding the 2020 summit, the negative reaction by the conservatives just shows how they cannot think outside the square. This is why the are in opposition in every state in Australia. Most good businesses are successful because they can think outside the square.
Looks like the Bolter has fallen in love. With a Scottish Chef who swears like a bullocky.
To see just how irrelevant this clown and his colleagues such as JA have become since the demise of the Rodent & Co., have a quick squiz at this verbal garbage.
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/column_baking_with_blue_passion
Gordon brown in the UK is under pressure on his leadership but told a journalist
“I am going nowhere”
Sure I’ve heard that before somewhere else.
The media over there is very anti labor at the moment but they deserve it, I think on the whole the media here are giving labor a fair go, I’ve seen A. Crabb write ba;anced articles that criticise both sides, she appears on the whole quite balanced and writes well.
There will always be those that do not change their spots, but I don’t think you can bag a journo just for criticising labor. We had enough of the “careful he might hear you” years.
Scorpio, always thought Bolt was a bit sus!
One thing about Janet A’s blog. She brings in Mark Latham to help her condemnation of the Summit. Pies has long had to rely on Latham, whose diary must be really irrelevant now, 6 months into the Rudd govt?
Guess they are running out of ideas in Rudd-hating reactionary bloglandia?
I seriously doubt Newspoll is going to be 64/36 (or similar).
It’s not that Rudd hasn’t been performing well – it’s just that the Coalition has a base level of support which will never move.
Remember that last year, the best Rudd got from Newspoll was 61/39 (correct me if I’m wrong). Since he was on 59/41 last time, I’m tipping a statistically insignificant movement to 60/40.
As for PPM – who knows? Could Brendan07 fall to within the MOE of not registering at all (i.e, less than 3.5%)? Surely not…
235
Basil Fawlty – over my dead body! It’s bad enough that we may become a Republic but to change our flag would be a complete and utter disgrace throwing away all our history so that elitists like you can have the Union Jack off our flag….
Might i remind you that Fiji is a Republic and they’ve still kept the Union Jack on their flag!
Yay Glen, let’s take all our cues from Fiji shall we.
And who are these elites you are talking about, count the Queen as one would you?
Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II of Australia is above elitism Timbo.
Of course she is Glen, so who are these elites? please enlighten us.
From wikipaedia:
Characteristics of the “elite”
Attributes that identify an elite vary; personal achievement may not be essential. Elite usually denotes a person or group who is the best in a class. Elite attributes include:
* Rigorous study of, or great accomplishment within, a particular field of study
* A long track record of competence in a demanding field
* An extensive history of dedication and effort in service to a specific discipline (e.g., medicine or martial arts)
* A high degree of accomplishment, training or wisdom within a given field.
Some synonyms for elite might be “World class,” “Upper-class,” and “Aristocratic,” indicating that the individual in question is capable of participating effectively at the very highest levels of his or her chosen discipline.
And if that’s not enough – have an ironic chuckle while reading:
http://www.answers.com/topic/elitism#copyright
Ominod, for gods sake we don’t want anyone like that anywhere near the decision making process.
Glen is just following the conservative mantra on elites, doing what he is told. For those that haven’t seen it here’s Bill Maher’s take on the elite. Please use caution, it is extremely funny!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBzYSUI5_GM
Chris B all one had to do was look at the 2020 Summit delegates 95% of whom were left wing cultural elitists who are hung up on issues like a Republic and a Bill of Rights!
Have a look at the video Glen.
Just a touch of exaggeration there Glen.
Glen let me know if you would count anyone of these as elites,
Lachlan Murdoch
James Packer
Heather Ridout
David Flint
Rosanna Capolingua
Malcolm Turnbull
Mark Taylor
Mark Taylor was an elite cricketer. I thought Howard liked cricket? Do we want a team of non elite cricketers?
Timbo there is a difference between being an a part of the elite and being a left wing elitists!
Rudd and Obama have something in common they both espouse left wing elitism.
#247:
Gotta love that.
A heriditary, multi-millionaire female monarch who runs around in a golden coach, who lives in castles, who is also Head of the Church Of England (which only reluctantly allows female ministers) as Queen Of Australia where laws (signed by her representative, who at once stage was a prince of the Anglican church) apply that purport to prevent discrimination on the grounds of gender or religion is above elitism?
Is it no wonder non-Australians (especially from many Muslim countries that we accuse of running theocracies!) shake their head in wonderment at the silliness and yes – elitism – of it all?
They just can’t think outside the square.
252 ah yes – it’s in my favourites.
Always good for treatment after accidentally clicking on a news.com.au comments section.
AND… you can’t even touch her on the arse without getting George Brandis all hot and steamy about it.
“there is a difference between being an a part of the elite and being a left wing elitists”
yep – usually it’s the intelligence of the person applying the term
Bill Heffernan was participating actively and actually coming up with good ideas in his part of the Summit. Tim Fisher and other Liberals likewise.
Don’t spew your bile in here, please, Glen.
256 Timbo:
Glen let me know if you would count anyone of these as elites,
Lachlan Murdoch
James Packer
Heather Ridout
David Flint
Rosanna Capolingua
Malcolm Turnbull
Mark Taylor
You could add to that list former deputy PM Tim Fisher. He comes across as a really decent individual. When you compare him to his predecessors (Anderson and Vaile) he stands out as a champion of ordinary people. I think Keating, as much as I admire his style and wit, was very unfair in the way he ridiculed Fisher.
Glen, sorry @258 maybe your post was badly written but it seems to me that you are saying that elitism is ok, as long as those elites are not left wing. Is this correct, do you actually process what you are saying before you write it?
Glen’s just upset that the summit has come up with so many good ideas that it is undermining the Liberal elite!
Steve K @265 Absolutely! the conservative side of politics lost out big time, the day he retired, it’s hard to think of anyone more affable and decent in Australian public life.
266
Timbo – i am merely saying that left wing elitists are not relevant to today’s society.
267
Chris B – what Liberal elite?
They come from Toorak and South Yarra in Melbourne.
Glen. It would be helpful if you watched the video on You Tube. It’s very informative.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBzYSUI5_GM
Glen here is the dictionary definition of elite, not the politacal one.
“upper class, ruling class, power elite, cream; see aristocracy, best.”
http://www.yourdictionary.com/elite
That’s interesting the dictionary left out the elite left, it must be wrong!
Glen, @ 269 but right wing elitsts are?
I cannot believe that half the day on this post has been spent debating whether the participants at the Summit were ‘elite’ or not and whether or not that’s a good thing.
I’ll try to sum it up for you – yes, the people who were at the Summit can be considered “elite”. If they weren’t “elite”, then they probably wouldn’t have been invited there in the first place. After all, it was supposed to be a collection of “Australia’s best and brightest”.
Second, whilst some (if not most) of the “elite” were left-leaning (no real surprise there), there were several conservatives there as well (and not just a token amount). After all, people like Heather Ridout, Bill Heffernan, Andrew Forrest, Gerard Henderson and Miranda Devine would not take likely to be considered “left-leaning”…
More about the left wing victory in Paraguay. Turning the South American map various shades of red.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/21/world/americas/21paraguay.html?hp
And then there’s the big one in November.
Chris B…what about Silvio Berlusconi’s victory for the conservatives in Italy…the Communists didn’t win any seats there lol!
Let’s also not forget Nepal, which the Bush Government funded the ruling elites battle against the insurgents. Oops there goes that word again.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601091&sid=akXXJLX24IxA&refer=india
Yes I suppose even supporting a corrupt party is better than the reds.
Although in the US a win for the left turns the map blue. The yanks do everything backwards.
The debate about elites seems to me to be a little unreal. Who cares if someone is “elite” (whatever that may mean) provided they come up with good ideas. Conversely who cares if someone is “ordinary” (whatever that may mean!) provided they come up with good ideas. Branding people like this has no value unless one is trying to denigrate them and their sincere contributution using any basis no matter how unsound. I would suggest in the context of the Summit the ideas are what should be evaluated and not their persons, especially using such vague stereotypes.
The Summit was part of a tried and true Change Process as stated elsewhere in this Blog. It was hardly radical or a stunt as some people have implied. It is also part of planning without which no Corporation could exist long term. People are just not use to seeing planning as part of the political process over a long period such as up to 2020, it is usually only 3 years and shorter. Besides the obvious electoral issues involved in short time frames it does require genuine imagination to plan for long time frames.
Besides the intrinsic value of the ideas, the high profile of the Summit could very well trigger indirectly and legitimise much more use of the imagination in the Corporate and Work fields in the general community. It depends on how it is followed up.
This can only be good for Australia.
I am surprised that the Summit didn’t even speculate about longer parliamentary terms for federal politics or optional preferential voting ect. But the elitists i guess wanted a Republic and Bill of Rights more oh well!
Doug, I won’t take Glens bait.
ChrisB 286. Have to admit, it was pretty funny.
Timbo. Sure was.
I like to go fishing like that myself occasionally.
It’s the only reason I visit Andrew Bolts blog
something nice
“Believe it or not Kevin Rudd features in a brand new single that’s just been released today. No, it’s not another track in the vein of Pauline Pantsdown. The track is a reworked version of From Little Things Big Things Grow and it samples Rudd’s apology to the Stolen Generations.”
http://www.samesame.com.au/news/local/2313/From-Little-Things-Big-Things-Grow.htm
video here
http://www.getup.org.au/media/TheGetUpMob/
Just been perusing some of the right-wing blogs….
What’s analagous term for “Howard Hater” for those on the right wing?
At least most in the left waited till Howard actually did horrible things. Even talking seems enough to set some of these guys off!
“Rudd Ridiculer” is is reasoable but seems to have one too many syllables.
“Rudd Basher” sounds better…
“ABC Radio Presenter” works, but would be lost on many…
Any other ideas?
292 Rates Analyst
Spot on! They hate him with a passion already! What for? Like you I became a Howard Hater but that was after Iraq, Tampa, Hicks, GST etc etc
260 Glen Says:
“Timbo there is a difference between being an a part of the elite and being a left wing elitists!”
Priceless. Yes Glen, the left wing elitists are different – they are smarter!! ROTFL So the Right Wing Elite are too elitist to let the Left wing elite into their definition of Elite? Now that is trully elitist. I herby declare myself to be part of the Egalitarian Left, and to deny any connection to the Radical Right, or the Left Wing Elite, which is not elitist, and therefore does not exist
Scoprio 234
Thanks that made me feel much happier about teh outcomes of teh 2020 summit. They didn’t really sovel anything in my are (transport and infrastructure) but the republic and other political outcomes are quite sensible.
Rates Analyst I’ll second that. It maybe because he beat Howard.
Sorry for my abysmal typing above. In summary, having read the 2020 summit outcomes document now, I don’t think it was anywhere near as bad as reported. And that is coming from a (left-wing elitist?) sceptic of the thing.
Socrates. I think we have had enough of this discussion, he doesn’t listen anyway.
Thomarse @ 293 I’ll play the devils advocate and say I was a Howard HAter from day 1
Hahahahaha Timbo!
I heard him speak something somewhere in that horrible dead dull montonous voice he has and groaned “and another 3 years of this drone? groan!” but that was not exactly hating now eh?
I’ll say I didn’t like him, but I wasn’t a Howard Hater.
Glen at 233, if you hadnt previously lost the plot (and am happy to debate that one) you have now. You’re saying you dont care about Newspoll? I’d say your side better take pretty good notice of those god awful numbers if they want to try to shift them.
Your ridiculous diatribe against the summit proves what a good idea it was and how much it gets under the torie skin when there is a popular PM and it’s not theirs!!
Here we go, John Roskam told ABC radio’s The World Today program that the summit was a blatantly political exercise. Why don’t they just ask Glen for his unbiased opinion, it would be just as relevant.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/04/21/2222966.htm
Who’s running the ABC? The Liberal Party’s proper gander machine?
302
Chris B Says:
Here we go, John Roskam told ABC radio’s The World Today program that the summit was a blatantly political exercise.
But the ABC is a permanently left wing dominated insitution, just like all the other institutions in our society. Didn’t you get the talking point memo?
Sorry, I missed that memo. Must have had a sickie. Only lefties have sickies.
Righties turn up even if they’re dead.
Yes Chris, Phil Ruddock been getting away with it for years
And even if there dead with a doctors certificate, it was probably fake.
Every time they use comments form the IPA they should preface it with ‘liberal party support group’ so all can filter their views appropriately.
But the silly ABC and the Madam of the ‘thought police’ are getting it wrong again.
Putting criticism of the 2020 summit up front all day on the news and web site is only keeping the affair in front of the public eye where it is most likely viewed in an apolitical way, and probably positive at that. The got it wrong if they thought they were turning a positive into a negative.
Turnbull has the nack of putting hoof in mouth whenever he tries to be smart.
Fresh from trying to belittle/criticise the Head of Treasury and the RBA board and referring to inflation as fantasy, he again from the USA, criticised Swan for crying wolf on inflation. He reckons the RBA should not have put up rates in January and so on, that it is really all under control.
No sooner than the Bullhead has opened his mouth than we see this:
Higher producer price index figures to fuel inflation
Figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) show higher construction, food, petrol and utility costs have pushed the country’s Producer Price Index (PPI) up by its biggest quarterly increase in 10 years.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/04/21/2223025.htm
Hoof in Mouth cant take a trick. Whatever he says tends to be the opposite of reality.
Glen @ 247 says:
“Basil Fawlty – over my dead body! It’s bad enough that we may become a Republic but to change our flag would be a complete and utter disgrace throwing away all our history so that elitists like you can have the Union Jack off our flag”
Glen. Not necessarily over your dead body old chap, but if you insist. This elitist is happy to oblige any recalcitrant right winger in such matters
Seriously, I do have some sneaking reluctant admiration for Glen. He has got guts to come in here day after day and act as our whipping boy, as frustrating as he can be at times. Unlike some of the other tory mouthpieces such as Tabitha and GP et al he perseveres against all odds.
In Sybils best voice, “BASIL leave that elitist word alone. You’ll only start Glen off again”. Now go and whack Manuel.
I thought that Glen was Tabitha.
I’m sure something like that came out after the election.
Glen, whose history are we referring to here? Is it the history of our First People, the Greeks, Italians, Croats, Chinese, Vietnamese etc who came to our country and helped to build it, where does the Union Jack relate to them. My ancestors were Anglo-Celtic and many of them were early pioneers (1820’s) but I am not so narcissistic as to believe that only my ‘history’ represents Australia.
I for one am very proud of my Scottish forebears, but see no real relevance in a symbol of the Union dating back to the 1600’s, in fact to me it represents a reminder of the oppression of the Scots by the English in order to achieve it. Time to move on and adopt the Eureka flag, the real symbol of Australia, then I will be proud of it.
He’s from Barcelona you know!
Kina Says: @ 309,
Shussss. Don’t tip the stupid beggars off. It’s been such an enjoyable experience watching them squirm every time they put forward another “top class”, winning formula, negative, intending to bring down Rudd, Gillard, Garrett etc and the polls just continue to climb.
Watching them try to gain traction by continually sprouting forth negatives that they think will bring home the bacon is like watching a continual flight of flying, pink pigs passing by overhead away from the proliteriate, calmly going about their business below.
307
Timbo
He he.
This is what the RWDC’s were up to during the 2020 summit. Unashamedly plagiarised from Biolter’s Blog, courtesy of Blogocracy.
[Rudd Lingo
Ruddspeak – An endless stream of jargon and clichés in two different languages
Ruddfuscation – The art of totally confusing the listener by using Ruddspeak
Ruddled – The way you feel after being subjected to a string of Ruddfuscation filled with Ruddspeak
Rudded – Where Australia is right now
Ruddstock – A talkfest of celebrities, Ruddites and wannabes telling Rudd what he wants to hear
Rudderless – What once was considered a state of confusion but now is considered to be significantly better state than being Rudded.
Ruddless – What we will again be one day we hope
Ruddfest – A gaggle of reporters interviewing Rudd
Ruddite – An Australian voter who is still in love with Rudd after 100 days of being Rudded by Ruddspeak and Ruddfuscation
Ruddage – What is produced by a Ruddstock
Rudditorial – A supposedly independent piece of journalism written by a reporter who has been overcome by Ruddspeak and Ruddfuscation at a Ruddfest
Ruddoration – The adoration and acclaim attributed to Rudd by Ruddites
Krudd – What the average Australian thinks of Ruddspeak
Ruddtopia – The place Ruddites believe Rudd will take them to if they bestow sufficient Rudderation
Ruddicism – A word that has lost its real meaning as a result of repeated inclusion in utterances of Ruddspeak eg. target
Ruddister – A Rudd appointed minister of government seemingly, but not necessarily, a Ruddite
Ruddflip – An adroit policy backflip that when announced in Ruddspeak, clouded by Ruddfuscation, and discussed in Rudditorials comes to be seen as nothing more than Ruddage. Often results in the public feeling Ruddled.
Ruddotistical – Considering oneself equal to Rudd
Ruddmania – The hysteria created by a gaggle of Ruddites expressing Ruddoration. Prominent in the Australian press over recent times.
Tony (Reply)
Sun 20 Apr 08 (11:10pm)
http://blogs.news.com.au/news/blogocracy/index.php/news/comments/rudd_raters/#commentsmore
318 Scorpio, agree totally, just heard Dolly mincing on the crystal set about what a waste of time blahdeblah. They are just sooooo yesterday, so absolutely f****** irrelevant to anything, dead in the water!
One of Lord Lunchalot’s daughters who lives in his Canberra house has apparently been looking for new digs and there are unconfirmed reports that the house is on the market so standby for an announcement.
Lets all pray to the media gods that we never have to hear his ‘dulcet’ tones again once he’s buggered off!
heheheh been hearing his idiotic pronouncement on radio here at work. What a waste of time and he was our Foreign Minister???
My condolences to you MayoFeral for to endure Lord Lunchalot for so long. I just hope the pain will eases soon as this “prize boofhead” ride off into the sunst!
And for those that have missed it:
The South American countries that have left wing governments
Brazil
Peru
Argentina
Ecuador
Chile
Uruguay
Venezuela
and now
Paraguay
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7357874.stm
George has been to busy in Iraq to interfere in South America
Also Nicaragua in Central America.
The only country in South America not left wing is Columbia. Funny about that.
No matter what you think of the 20-20 summit you have to admit it is better than the usual political game at this time of year.
Next week or maybe later this week it will be back to budget speculation. But Rudd has a thousand or so opinion leaders feeling all warm and fuzzy after their Ra Ra session.
Brendan snookered again.
I’ve got to laugh when the current opposition to Rudd consists of Brendan Nelson, Dolly Downer and David Flint: nothing says yesterday quite like those 3!
Is there a new Newspoll tomorrow in the Australian? How low will Brendan go this time?
Everybody was probably polled in the middle of all the 2020 summit news.
Expect a dip then. TPP 58 – 42. Both Nelson and Rudd to drop.
I think George Bush will bring home the troops to stop the socialist hoards from the south.
And what sort of left wing governments are they in South America?
Other than Venezeula and Bolivia i think all the others are Pseudo Left governments, similar to Australia.
There should be, I was polled on Saturday.
Read in the papers that on economic committee at the summit the people pushing for tax reform or actually tax cuts were the business leaders and tax cuts for whom. Yep you guessed it themselves. Already over the last five years experiencing massive wage rises well above inflation our CEO’s want tax reform and as usual it seems the government has swallowed the bait.
They should be offered a deal, cut the top income tax rate, as long as they accept a commensurate increase in the business tax rate.
Do not agree they should be paying more tax. We need a fairer country. T
Just because Business leaders etc put tax reform forward it does not mean they will get any reduction. My understanding from what Rudd, Swan have said in the past is that the emphasis is on other areas for tax benefits as it makes it worthwhile for them to work, including overtime. This will help ecoonomy with labour shortages and skill shortages.
That’s probably not the smart way to go. It makes more sense to cut the corporate tax rate (say to 25%) and progressively lower personal income tax rates over time.
Doing this means that overseas businesses will be more attracted to invest in Australian and/or establish a presence here. And more overseas investment invariably leads to more Australian jobs and higher GDP growth…
The northern countries are more hard left than the southern. Nicaragua is the sandinstas again. That is hard left, that Ronald Reguns (mr. what’s this red button for)? The Alzheimer president. Spent millions illegally fighting against.
I did mention earlier that they were various shades of red.
Swing Lowe The opposite is the case in most European countries. That is why they dominate the rich countries list.
Just saw the bloke on the 7.30 Report in addition to Eddixender. There couldn’t be a more stark contrast. The bloke is articulate, coherent, speaks to the question, says when he doesn’t know or needs to do more work to speak to whatever the question is, and then there’s Eddixender, frothing at the mouth at the temerity of the Australian population wanting an Australian head of state, and spouting the talking points from LP headquarters. I reckon Newspoll will be awful for the LNP, say somewhere between 58 to 60 TPP to Labor.
Whaddya think about calling Rudd “the bloke”? Got to better than some of the garbage that’s been going around.
And probably why the US is in so much trouble now and at the end of the Reaganomics era. Remember Clinton’s its the economy stupid. Reganomics got him there.
Chris B,
The fastest growing countries in Europe are those with low corporate tax rates (think Ireland, Estonia, etc). They lowered their tax rates in order to grow as fast as possible.
Meanwhile, the European countries with the lowest growth rates are (for the most part) those with higher taxes (although I concede the Scandinavian countries defy this – still don’t know why). That’s why most of the EU have growth expectations with a 0 or 1 in front of it…
Ah yes, Chris B. who’d want to be POTUS? Have been reading other threads with interest, but am buggered if I can figure out what any of them think they can do with an almost basket case economy. It’s almost like Battlestar Galactica. For those not into this series, basically, humans create AI robots, the robots evolve and revolt, and wage war on humans because we’re so evil. Unfortunately, in trying to wipe out the evil humans, the AI robots do exactly the same. Sound familiar?
Yes they are doing well, but the richest country ahead of the USA is Finland.
345 Harry. This election could be one of the first where no one will be able to filibuster. That is stall the reforms so desperately needed. Moveon.org is actually campaigning on that theme. They need to get to 65 votes. More would be preferable.
http://www.moveon.org/campaigns.html
That is in the senate. There are 10 seats within their grasp possible 15. Only 10 needed.
Spot on Chris B, taxes are higher in many of the scandanivan countries and what kind of economies do they have- very good quality of life, social programs (welfare), health and education systems. Companies such as Scania, Volvo, Sony Ericsson, Ericsson, Phillips and Nokia… Now what does Australia have which is comparable answers please?
Just on taxes, are our tax levels to high? No
No and this answers it http://www.ato.gov.au/budget/2007-08/bp1/html/bp1_bst5-10.htm
And people carrying on about our petrol prices, we are low here as well.
The argument about efficiency and competivetness is a nonsense, put simply it should be about creating a better country and not speculation which is what many of rich and business people have been doing.
Thatcher is another one who cut taxes for the rich. Remember Thatcherism? Britain’s version of Reganomics. What a mess they got into. Hence Blair.
I remember when my favourite socialist George Soros started manipulating the British Pound they almost went under. They quickly withdrew from the Euro.
Yep the same in America, with their massive debt- hence Clinton. The same again under Bush.
The same but different in regards to debt- hardly any public debt but significant private debt and why because governments do not do anything, it is left up to the people… hence education, houses, healthcare, everything has been privatised or is run by private operators. Again higher taxes create societies in which everyone benefits and creating better economies, due to excellent education, healthcare and social programs, especially when it comes to training and vocational employment programs.
Chris B,
Blair was the PM who said “We are all Thatcherites now”.
Thatcher’s economic reforms are now recognised as the ideal model of economic leadership (although it may not always be politically popular)
Sorry talking about Australia.
That wasn’t the Euro. That was European Exchange Rate Mechanism. Somewhat different kettle of fish. (but still fish).
Yep Swing Lowe but whom sings such praises.. the media and business elites who get noticed due to their certain newspapers owners. These were the people who benefited. Not the people in working classes suburbs or the poor.
Always the way when you privatise and cut taxes.
Off the current topic a little, I have question on the state play in NSW. If Iemma and Kosta are expelled from the ALP for disloyalty, how many will follow them and not the party? Only need 6 MPs to go, you have a hung parliament.
And what happens if there is a hung parliament with fixed terms there?
They will not be expelled. But should be occurring in New South Wales is Federal Intervention from its Federal ranks. Unfortunately it will not occur because the NSW party probably controls the federal party. Put simply i think both parties have some probs behind the scenes.
I always type quicker than my thoughts, typically left moron… Meant to state what should be occurring…
But if it occurred than it would be up to independents to decide the situation, that is if NSW have some lower house independents? Can someone enlighten me…
Iemma and Costa won’t get expelled.
The privatisation will happen and the unions won’t be happen. Of course, if the privatisation goes well (a big if), it would probably be enough to secure another 4 year term for the ALP given the current inept state of the State Libs.
That said, if things go badly (e.g, power bills soar soon after the privatisation), it will sink the government. But then again, given how bad things are going for the NSW Government at the moment, a big gamble like this is probably worth going for…
I would never thought that of you marky.
There are a 6 lower house independents in NSW. They are in the following seats:
1. Sydney (Clover Moore)
2. Tamworth
3. Lake Macquarie (vs Labor)
4. Port Macquarie (Rob Oakeshott’s seat)
5. Dubbo
6. Northern Tablelands (Torbay – the Speaker)
Torbay and the MLA for Dubbo will definitely vote for Labor. Torbay’s a Labor mate, whilst the MLA for Dubbo wouldn’t have been elected if it hadn’t been for Labor running dead in the 2007 Election. So too does the MLA for Tamworth (same reason).
The rest will probably vote for the Coalition (although you never know with rural independents)…
So in NSW, Is it possibly to engineer the demise of one’s own government with a vote of no confidence if they desire an early election?
The Victorian power companies want it because due to the corporatised power companies in New South Wales their has been a cap on prices.
The people in New South Wales have much to look forward to, companies ringing and knocking on your door during dinner and prices interesting enough between companies not much different thus you have to compare the different bits and pieces and when you do prices tend to be the same.
And it comes to maintenance and power companies doing things after storms you really have no idea who your company is who looks after your area. This was the case here in Victoria recently when we had a major blackout many of us had no idea who was looking after the blackout in their area..
And will staffing levels drop… You betcha…
B.S time you laughed at yourself and lightened up.. but…
Thanks Swing Lowe.
That will mean 3 and 3 – Good at adding up ah… So we are left with a deadlock still, hang on not sure about the erratic Clover Moore do you think she would support the Libs…
Mind you Labor deserves to go down in New South Wales, they have pathetic, inept and tacitly corrupt?
Actually who will own the privatised companies, Australian companies or a host of overseas multinationals’.. More reason to lower our taxes to encourage Australian entrepeneurship… No just to speculate and buy a few more paintings for offices and to buy another boat on the harbour…
chris, i was amazed the lead story on ABC radio all day (as least when I tuned in) was the Australia Institute’s criticism of the summit. Are we really paying for this crap, and when does the board change??
yip yip farkin yip
also the lead story on Yahoo7 online. even if the opposition was saying it it would be dubious as a lead story, but the Australia Institute? What would you expect them to say??
SL @ 353 ‘the ideal model of economic leadership’
Must be fun down that end of the right wing alp seesaw but when you rise for air do please explain. Nothing quite like a generic 101 ‘bone’ for the masses eh… simple $ easy…neh? I assume you are joking, of course. Re the ‘perceived’ & ‘cemented’ wisdom that is.
What are you on about Marky? If you look at my comment I said I didn’t think you were how you discribed yourself. Peace Mate. (My opinion however could change if you play the man and not the ball).
Did not mean anything by it, and i know you didn’t either.. cheers.
thanks, Chris B. for link.
Morgan seems to be doing more phone polls lately. They might do one on the 2020 summit. That will show what the public actually thinks of the whole kit and kaboodle. I don’t think we are truely representive group…..
Bloody hell, I’m just hanging out for Newspoll! What a poll junkie I’ve become, and William, in the spirit of the previous political era, it’s all your fault. You gem!
Well. Jeez, B. S. Fairman, we do provide a representation of the left wing latte, chardonnay sipping left wing elites ( Howard haters subcommittee), don’t we?
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23578004-601,00.html
Brendan has “clawed his way back into double digits” (9 -> 10%, break out the champers!)
61/39. Gawd they’re screwed. Good.
377- Yes, I hated Howard too. And I like my Lattes.
New thread up.